Cold Heart

If you ever had trouble believing that filmmaking can be learned in 24 hours: meet Karthik Subbaraj, who got his basic filmmaking education in a one-day course called Film Camp Sanjay Nambiar, followed by years of making shorts while working in software, as well as assisting indie auteur Mark Williams during a two-year stint in the United States. Like Nalan Kumarasamy and Balaji Mohan, Subbaraj finally came to prominence through Naalaya Iyakunar. Which, judging by Cold Heart, must have its seedy side: gangsters are very active behind the scenes of a reality show for young hopefuls looking for a way into the movie business by making short films.

A dark comedy of manners in the guise of a grimly gutsy gangster epic (with some post-Tarantinoesque panache and smarts) whose jokes are so well-aimed they hurt. Woah!