HBO’s seminal television-program, Girls was disliked particularly because it provoked an uncomfortable feeling in its audience’s gut—the sense of second-hand embarrassment that sends a shiver down… Read More »Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger (Parthiv Chhabria)
“Horror films are generally not as circumspect about maintaining the reality effect as Freud would like”, Jonathan Crane presents as a contradiction to the psychologist’s… Read More »“That’s not my sister-in-law…” (Parthiv Chhabria)
Another man’s abject object can be another’s subject—it is, after all, the incongruity between appearances that produces the humorous effect. Absurdity, in particular, appears to… Read More »The Absurdity of Customer Service (Parthiv Chhabria)
Every definition of pure, or naïve camp tells a different story of a failed seriousness—a sincere intention to be perceived as high-art, which is ironically… Read More »“What you see isn’t always the truth”: The Camp Sensibilities of Drag
Since its release, Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance (2024) has evaded explicit taxonomy—seemingly a hagsploitation horror, a sci-fi thriller, and a surreal comedy, at once (that is, if… Read More »Umm… There’s been a slight misuse of the Substance (Parthiv Chhabria)
I was particularly taken by a question that Norbert Elias poses in his essay on laughter, reckoning with the often contradictory purpose of laughter. He… Read More »Laughing Gas in A Housefull Theatre (Parthiv Chhabria)
I would never not immediately jump at the opportunity to discuss what is perhaps my favourite film of all time, 2010’s Aisha, which is the… Read More »(Re)marriage is defined in Webster’s Dictionary as… (Parthiv Chhabria)
Mary Douglas describes both definitions of the joke, be it Bergson’s or Freud’s, as an attack on the formal by the informal—here, the only difference… Read More »Shoot For The Stars, Aim for The Punchline (Parthiv Chhabria)
As Bergson describes the loosely defined rules of comedy, he reflects upon the innate comedy of the man acting as a machine—the repetition of an… Read More »Laughter and Labour: The Comedy of Severance’s Opening Credits – Parthiv Chhabria
Aneez Bazmee’s Welcome (2007) would air every Thursday night on the same television-channel for the greater part of my childhood. This classic Bollywood film is… Read More »Passing The Proverbial Pie in Welcome (2007) – Parthiv Chhabria