CTRL Movie Review: Ctrl+Alt+Repeat

Movie CTRLOn NetflixDir Vikramaditya MotwaneCast Ananya Panday Vihaan SamatRating 355If there were too many CtrlC CtrlV as in copypaste filmmakers in the worldmdashnaturally inclined towards a certain style or recurring themethought in their storytellingmdash Vikramaditya Motwane the director of CTRL is easily the furthest from itHis last film that Irsquove yet to watch is a documentary Indiararsquos Emergency Right after a mockumentary AK vs AK that followed a superhero flick Bhavesh Joshi and a oneroom oneactor drama Trapped before thatCTRL has been described by the filmmakers themselves as a screenlife thriller Or what one would call a computerscreen movie Which is a film that goes from script to screen to screen to screenhellipThat is switching between various screen devicesmdashphone laptop CCTVmdashfrom where the characters respond to events or interact with each otherIn short the camera is both the lens and the prime locationThis movie starts off following the lives of a cutesy GenZ committed couple who from Day One of dating have decided to overshare every moment of their lives onlinemdashturning hence into lsquoinfluencersrsquo that brands in turn can potentially profit from since the eyeballs are already on themThis is reflective enough of a social media culture Which is what if not us truly living inside the profoundly prophetic Truman Show 1998mdashwhether as lsquocontentcreatorsrsquo or addicted voyeurs noWhat about the girlfriendboyfriend Ananya Panday Vihaan Samat who naturally derive audiences from painting the rosiest picture of their loverelationship until the boy gets caught cheating on cameraBeyond the boy it appears to me that the girl is sadder for the fact of losing her social media currency as a result of this public embarrassmentThat currency equals real money after allmdashfor whatever that says about the reality of relationships in a predominantly virtual worldHave you seen a reallife couple like NellaJoe from this film Therersquos one in the Netflix documentary series Ashley Madison Sex Lies amp Scandal 2024 wherein a YouTuber influencer couple SamNeil similarly document their married life for clicks onlineThe guyrsquos name showed up on the list of blokes on Ashley Madison a site exclusively for married people to hook up That data got breached in 2015 The girl if I recall right was eventually okay to have him back There was far more to lose than a marriage in this caseNo such luck for Joe Samat with Nella Panday Hersquos deeply apologetic for a stray incident as it were She may seem obsessed with public attentionOtherwise shersquos not too different from any other youngling whorsquos a native to the Internet Still with her heart and emotions in the same placeAfter Call Me Bae a quasisassy comedydrama series 2024 Prime and Arjun Varain Singhrsquos engaging Kho Gaye Hum Kahan 2023 Netflix this is Pandayrsquos third piece of content that surveys the lives of GenZlate millennials perennially at the intersection of an offline and online world that they inhabit simultaneouslyThis could be a coincidence Although the conscious choice of a subjectsubject to pick is notThat said I canrsquot think of a legit Bollywood leadestablished female actor more suited than Pandaymdashequally a starlevel influencer in her own right 25 million followers on Insta in her mid20smdashfor a part that captures the zeitgeist or spirit of the socialmedia age we live inIf anything she might be more search resource or muse for Motwane 47 on this story by Avinash Sampath AK v AK with standup comedian Sumukhi Suresh on the peppy dialoguesIn equal parts vulnerable and vain wholly real Panday literally owns this space As she does the film that shersquos in practically every frame of from start to finishIrsquom told CTRL got shot over 16 days with postproduction work that took 16 months Which makes screenlife technically a tough genre to tameRussianKazakh filmmaker Timur Bekmambetov Unfriended is supposed to be the genrersquos global ambassador of sorts Hersquos an execproducer on CTRL that isnrsquot Indiarsquos first such mainstream featureThat applause ought to go to Mahesh Narayanrsquos fine Fahadh Faasil starrer CU Soon 2020 Which was a much darker claustrophobic thrillerCTRL feels more relatable nextdoor fun reallymdashalso given Sneha Khanwalkarrsquos supremely zingy soundtrack covering rsquo80s pop hiphop ballads even Prateek Kuhad ie ldquoSouth Bombayrsquos Arijit Singhrdquo as a friend puts it wellI suspect this is why when the film switches to a wider commentary on AI dystopian datamining et al you sense the ambition hardly matching the moodtheme thus farNo knock on the big message on big tech Surely yoursquove read and watched enough to freak the hell out on it starting with the Netflix doc The Social Dilemma 2020 of courseIrsquom just unsure it fits in as seamlessly without seeming slightly floozy into the film that Irsquove watched twice alreadymdashon TV and phone The latter offers a more intimate experienceAs you notice the final five minutesrsquo passage of no dialoguesmdashinfluencer retreating to rank anonymity checking her notifications gone silent feeling lost in the real worldhellipThe sort of melancholy that made us love Her 2013 so much And a director totally in controlAccept it screen life is real life Nothing futuristic about it anymore In fact it affects the old who are migrants to the Internet as much as the youngCTRL could do with an encore In a reverse sort of way that would be the surprise if Motwane pulls a sequel on his filmography

CTRL Movie Review: Ctrl+Alt+Repeat

Movie: CTRL
On: Netflix
Dir: Vikramaditya Motwane
Cast: Ananya Panday, Vihaan Samat
Rating: 3.5/5

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Home / Entertainment / Bollywood News / Article / CTRL Movie Review: Ctrl+Alt+Repeat

CTRL Movie Review: Ctrl+Alt+Repeat

Movie: CTRLOn: NetflixDir: Vikramaditya MotwaneCast: Ananya Panday, Vihaan SamatRating: 3.5/5

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Latest Photos

Latest Videos

Latest Web Stories

Mid-Day Fast

Movie: CTRL
On: Netflix
Dir: Vikramaditya Motwane
Cast: Ananya Panday, Vihaan Samat
Rating: 3.5/5