What Happened to this City? - Chasing The Dog
Thoughts On: What Happened to this City? (Ee Nagaraniki Emaindi, 2018)
A group of friends fall into a drunken adventure to fulfil their destiny to make short films.
Absolutely tremendous; far too much fun. Ee Nagaraniki Emaindi, or What Happened to this City, captures--better than any film I can think of--the essence and chaos of real, boyish friendship. With superlative performances and a giddy tone that embraces and amplifies the honest, broken and breathing humanity of its profoundly fleshed out characters masterfully, What Happened to this City somehow manages to instantly lock you into a friendship group that feels genuine and time-tested. We are pulled into the story of four friends to find highly relatable bumbling and embarrassingly touching vulnerability and then witness their lives unfold into adventure through the conquering of fear. The fear driving this narrative is existential and perhaps familiar to anyone with stupid dreams. But, if you want to be dumb, you of course have to be tough; and the willingness of our characters to hurt and suffer for their adventure is infectious. Evoking with sensational clarity a call to life, What Happened to this City is equal parts charming and inspiring. A great projection of what it means to chase the dog - to pursue the loyal and loving fool within ourselves as it manifests in the world - this is a delightful blast.
