Hindi
Micky Virus: There is a virus in my cinema ticket!
MUMBAI: Micky Virus attempts a contemporary theme of computers and hackers, weaving it around a murder mystery and bank fraud. The approach is kept on a lighter note for the most part, at least until the interval.
Manish Paul (Micky) belongs to a group of computer geeks in Delhi, with each member specialising in some sort of computer trick. They are led by the Harvard educated Nitesh Pandey, referred to as professor. The other members of the group are Puja Gupta, Raghav Kakkar and Vikesh Kumar. However, Paul has mastered the art of hacking and can get into any computer anywhere in the world however safe and secure.
Now, the ACP Manish Chaudhary and Inspector Varun Badola are looking for Paul not because hacking is a crime but because they need his expertise to crack a very tricky case. Two hackers of repute, both foreign citizens, have been found murdered in broad daylight and in a public place in the city with no obvious marks of harm. On investigation, Chaudhary learns that they were killed with a cyanide-tipped needle, both are non-Indians. Concluding that they were called to India to break into some computer, the cops want to enrol Paul to hack a site belonging to a gang of hackers.
Paul is allergic to any kind of job; the idea of working for someone is not his thing. But, with a little arm-twisting by the cops and a sudden need to make a living, as he has fallen in love in the meanwhile, make him accept the assignment. Paul’s romantic interest is Eli Avram, an executive at an investment firm. By the time the romance is a month old, Eli makes her move and asks Paul to correct a computer error she made with a client’s account. So far neither the film nor its story has moved anywhere except the hero falling in love with a very willing heroine.
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Producer: Arun Rangachari, Vivek Rangachari.
Director: Saurabh Varma. Cast: Manish Paul, Eli Avram, Manish Chaudhary, Varun Badola, Puja Gupta, Nitesh Pandey, Raghav Kakkar, Vikesh Kumar. |
By the end of the interval, the director finally feels the need to introduce some story in the film. Paul has been used by Eli to transfer rupees 100 crore from a government middleman’s account to another account. He has been framed. What is more, Eli is not around to tell him what happened because she has been killed the same way two hackers were killed earlier, with a poisoned needle. Paul finds out whose account the money is transferred to but that story ends as soon as it started as the man is killed in a very predictable road accident while being chased by Paul!
All the key punching in computers of all kinds continues until Paul suspects the identity of at least one of the people behind the plot. And after 2 hour and 10 minutes of running around, dropping hints, punching computers and displaying lot of geekeryon screen, it is not the script that tells you the story but through verbal outpouring by the culprits that all the plots are revealed. Some hacker story!
Micky Virus tries to fit in too much of effects without relevance or to any positive results. The film should have had an ideal length of 90 to 100 minutes. But it stretches by almost 30 minutes. The one time that the film generates some interest is when Eli is killed. Direction falls victim to a weak script. Paul acts the typical loud Delhi lad with set expressions throughout. Eli Avram is a misfit. Puja Gupta is good while Chaudhary and Badola are impressive.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
