Haider Movie Reviews
Avg. Critics Rating
Verdict: Super Hit based on 32 reviews
Avg. User Rating
4.3
Verdict: Blockbuster based on 100 reviews & ratings
5.0
Raja Sen | Rediff
Haider is one of the most powerful political films we’ve ever made, a bonafide masterpiece that throbs with intensity and purposeRead full review5.0
Subhash K Jha | SKJBollywoodNews
Vishal Bhardawaj’s third Shakespearean sojourn is his best yet.Haider is like a painting viewed from the road inside an art gallery…distant yet vivid,unforgettable layered lifelike and yet exquisitely poetic.Read full review
4.5
Mohar Basu | Koimoi
Haider Movie Review: 4.5/5 Stars. What’s Good: Only Bhardwaj could have thought of giving Hamlet the tinge of po...Read full review4.5
Shubha Shetty-Saha | Mid Day
As you watch the beauty of the valley wide-eyed, you can almost smell the Gulmohar in the air and touch the icy waters of Jhelum.The second half dips a bit before it picks up again with an unforgettable climax. Please watch this film. It has chutzpah (Haider’s favourite word for obvious reasons) and a lot of soul too.Read full review
4.0
Srijana Mitra Das | Times of India
Haider's uncle kills his father and marries his mother. Can Haider resolve his dilemma - to be or not to be revengeful?Read full review4.0
Kusumita Das | Deccan Chronicle
The pace slumps a little in the second half, but the slack is short-lived. By then the director’s craft has hypnotised you enough to overlook the slips. Considering Hamlet, with all its complexity, is certainly not an easy adaptation to venture into — that alone could well make this Vishal’s finest film yet.Read full review4.0
Sweta Kaushal | Hindustan Times
Watch the film for Vishal Bhardwaj’s direction, dialogues and touching acting prowess that almost everyone in Haider shows. Skip it if an intense, disturbing film is not your cup of tea or if entertainment is what you seek at movie theatres.Read full review4.0
Sukanya Verma | Rediff
Haider is bewitchingly clever…And it will haunt you long after you’ve left the theatre…Read full review4.0
Shibani Bedi | NDTV
With scintillating performances by almost all the actors and music which can give you goosebumps, Vishal Bhardwaj has literally created magic on screen. Shahid Kapoor, Tabu, Kay Kay Menon, Irrfan Khan as well as Narendra Jha have delivered scintillating performances, which keep you hooked to the plot from the word go.Read full review4.0
Sachin Chatte | The Navhind Times
Haider is eminently worth a watch. Above everything else, it has the chutzpah.Read full review
4.0
Martin D'Souza | Glamsham
Watching Vishal Bharadwaj’s HAIDER is like watching a classical concert on stage with ‘live’ musicians. There’s a Violin, Viola and Cello (all stringed instruments from the same family); all these instruments perform in perfect harmony. A flute renders its soulful melody whilst a piano pitches in perfectly to sync in harmony with the rest of the orchestra.Read full review4.0
Anjum Shabbir | Bollyspice
Haider is an experience which needs to be watched by audiences all over for it’s cinematography, directing, performances and as an accomplished adaptation of a literary classic. Encore team and cast of Haider, Encore!Read full review4.0
Piyush Chopra | NowRunning
It isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. The body count is extremely high (there are more corpses above ground than there are buried below it) and the film is dark and edgy to the point of excluding people. It is, after all, a Shakespearean tragedy. If this doesn’t interest you, you might want to look elsewhere for a “Bang” for your buck. On the other hand, if this is your kind of cinema, you won’t find a better way to spend 3 hours of your life.Read full review4.0
Ritika Handoo | Zee News
After watching ‘Haider’, all that can be said is that — It is a perfect example of how many have suffered in the Valley and are just left with the question— ‘To be or not to be’!Read full review4.0
Meeta Kabra | Wogma
After having seen films week-after-week and knowing there are so many more to be seen out there, very few inspire you to watch it again. And even fewer because each department played its role very close to perfection. Vishal Bharadwaj’s Haider is one of those rare ones. Yes, I will certainly watch this one again. Soon.Read full review3.5
Rajeev Masand | IBNLive
A few such hiccups aside, Haider is an elegant, thrilling film that casts a brave, unflinching eye on the Kashmir struggle. In deviating from the original ending of Hamlet, it also makes a necessary point about the cyclical nature of revenge and violence. Its deliberate pacing may not work for all, but this is a solid, well-acted movie that deserves your time.Read full review
3.5
Anupama Chopra | Hindustan Times
At the heart of Haider is the love between a passionate, complex woman who seeks a sliver of happiness amidst overwhelming circumstances, and her son, who both loves her with an unnatural intensity and hates her for her betrayal of his father. Vishal handles the Oedipal undertones with exquisite daring and understanding. This relationship powers the film. Haider must be seen for this alone.Read full review
3.5
Sarita Tanwar | DNA India
No matter what and how small the faults in the film, it deserves an audience. To experience a film that is so mesmerising that it will stay with you forever, even if it is in bits and pieces.Read full review
3.5
Rohit Khilnani | India Today
I will definitely recommend Haider, it’s a sure shot winner! Vishal Bhardwaj impresses once again! The only problem with Haider is it’s length of 2 hours and 40 minutes, it could have been much shorter with as much impact. Music by Vishal Bhardwaj is right for the film but not great, like it been in the past.Read full review3.5
Faheem Ruhani | India Today
Haider may seem a bit sluggish in the first half and slightly long. However, it makes up for most of it in the dramatic, intense climax that you are treated to towards the end. Haider is definitely a film you should not miss.Read full review3.5
Troy Ribeiro | IANS
“Haider” is a well made film complimented with dramatic performances, strong script and fine music. Don’t miss this one.Read full review3.5
Navin Noronha | BookMyShow
Haider is packed with memorable scenes and an underlying message, which stays with you long after you have left the cinema hall. The director treats the topic of political unrest in Kashmir nicely, and tries not to take sides. Yet the movie is not overtly sentimental and delves into the psyche of the characters and the effect the war has on them. This movie has a few minor pitfalls here and there, but otherwise it is a wonderful effort by Bhardwaj, and deserves to be watched.Read full review3.5
Bollywood Life | Bollywood Life
Haider is not just another movie but a brilliant cinematic experience that is beyond melodrama and unrealistic fantasies and typical Bollywood cliches. If you have an appetite for tragedy and revenge dramas, this one cannot be skipped.Read full review3.5
Sonia Chopra | Sify
Bhardwaj and co-writer Basharat Peer (who authored the book Curfewed Night based on the Kashmir conflict) give us a film that leaves you in its spell long after. And if you can overlook certain blemishes, you’ll be happy to be mesmerized!Read full review3.0
Rahul Desai | Mumbai Mirror
A more loosely based version might have provided a better structure and unpredictability to Haider’s psychological battle. Even though the film’s flaws are largely down to the nature of work it chooses to adapt, the universe it functions in is occasionally at odds with the characters.Read full review3.0
Daily Bhaskar | Daily Bhaskar
If you are amongst those cinema fans, who wait for a good movie, and typical Bollywood masala is not your cup of tea, then Haider is the film for you. It is cinema on canvas.Read full review3.0
IndiaGlitz | India Glitz
‘Haider’ is in a strange bracket it’s not at all mass friendly and its not rare piece of cinema like ‘Kaminey’ either. Falling in between ‘Haider’ is still is not a bad film, it’s a disappointment by the standards set by Bhardwaj in his earlier adaptations. ‘Haider’ narration, style and technique will initially attract the high end niche audience for whom any form of sensationalisms with or without conviction is artistic intelligence.Read full review3.0
Priyanka Prasad | FilmiBeat
A truly touching story that en-captures the saga of Hamlet in the best way possible. The climax is one of the best in Bollywood and the movie should not be missed for it has a soul that will touch you deep.Read full review2.5
Koel Purie | India Today
This film is not only a terrible missed opportunity but also an utter waste of heart wrenching performances and a beyond perfect costume and production design.Read full review
2.0
Shubhra Gupta | Indian Express
I doubt if I will be able to forget the stunning visuals which dot the film, but the sum is never more than its terrific parts. The craggy old gravediggers in a scene that soars, and the truest character of the film, Haider’s father ( played by Jha), channel the continuing tragedy that is Kashmir. As do the lovely `kani’ shawls flung over the shoulders of the characters, the wispy steam rising from the `kahwa’ cups, the conflicted tears that flow out of Tabu’s eyes . If only they had a film to match.Read full review2.0
Bollywood Hungama News Network | Bollywood Hungama
HAIDER is targeted more at niche multiplex audience and not for the masses, which may work against the film. Add to that, the lesser number of screens available for the film and its release alongside the gigantic competitor film BANG BANG may just see the film struggling at the Box-Office.Read full review2.0
Mayank Shekhar | The W14
What you’re left with then are a series of scenes stretching the film to almost 3 hours (without even a fulsome soundtrack) that tries to fit the original Hamlet—singing gravediggers, play within the play etc—into a movie with a hole. Eventually you start feeling vaguely distant and cold. I don’t know about you, but I’m sorry—I was kinda bored.Read full review
NR
Rachit Gupta | Filmfare
Haider doesn’t have an ounce of the commercial thrills and spills that entertain the 100-crore masses. But it does have an undeniable dramatic punch. It is one of the best stories you’ll every watch on celluloid. Give this edgy film a chance to entertain you. Because it will do so with aplomb. It’s certainly better than the other chutzpah out there.Read full reviewNR
Suprateek Chatterjee | Firstpost
If we get a movie better than Haider in the remainder of 2014, let’s count this as a really good year. At this point, the chances of that happening don’t seem likely.Read full review
NR
Deepanjana Pal | Firstpost
Haider is a moving film that tells the story of not just a character or a family, but of Kashmir itself. …It may ultimately leave you dissatisfied and heartbroken, but just for the first half, Haider is worth watching again and again.Read full reviewNR
Komal Nahta | Komal Nahta's Blog
Haider is a class-appealing fare which will do well in premium multiplexes and high-end single-screen cinemas of the big cities mainly. It will be enjoyed by the classes but it will not be liked by the masses. Business in lesser multiplexes and lesser single-screen cinemas as also in ‘B’ and ‘C’ class centres will be rather dull. Overall, average.Read full review
NR
Shilpa Jamkhandikar | Reuters
Haider has a lot of things going for it, but it doesn’t live up to what it could have been. In that way, it’s a little like Hamlet’s description of his his new step-father, the naughty uncle Claudius: “A little more than kin, and less than kind.”Read full reviewNR
Sanjukta Sharma | LiveMint
Haider is an immensely effective reimagination of Shakespeare—and the film’s biggest triumph is that the provincial, in this case Kashmir and the characters defined by its reality, shine in a universal and timeless tragedy.Read full review
NR
Sudhish Kamath | The Hindu
An absolutely delightful and lyrical adaptation of Hamlet that takes some liberties, for Kashmir’s sake…Read full reviewNR
JPN | Jagran
Helmed by the brilliant story teller Vishal Bharadwaj, ‘Haider’ comes with an unforgettable climax.Read full reviewNR
IndiaTvNews Reviewer | IndiaTvNews
Haider is a classic creation minus Bollywood’s cliché elements. It needs patience and your devotion.Read full review
-
4.5
My review of Haider (2014) by bangreaayushi
jyothimathur, 9 years agoNot to be missed one! The film is a hidden gem. The film is a sequel to William Shakespeare's Hamlet. The director of the film is Vishal Bharadwaj. The film is not meant to entertain you. Rather it is meant to give you the best in everything. This is what the movie’s plot tells all its audiences. The film starts with the story of Haider (Shahid) whose father (Narendra Jha) is arrested by the Indian army. He gets back to his place from Aligarh where he is studying. He comes to know that his mother (Tabu ) and his Uncle (Kay Kay Menon) is behind all this. Then, the film shows mother and son’s conflict in getting to know the death of his father. It is after this, he comes to know that his Uncle is responsible for all this and it is then he decides to take revenge of his father’s death. The director, Bharadwaj of this film allows you to see a different world of Kashmir. He depicts the troubles that are with the people in Kashmir. The film depicts the real stories of people living in Kashmir with many disturbing souls working only to live hard. Bharadwaj should be praised for making such a strong concept. He brings out the best from Shahid Kapoor and Shraddha Kapoor. This movie goes beyond all those problems, which have been shown in Pakistan. This movie has been composed with many great songs and the lyrics are too soothing. Actors such as Tabu, Key Key Menon have done complete justice with their roles. But it is Shahid who is the real show stealer of the film. You can’t shift your eyes from this man. After successive flops, Shahid had made it to give his best in this film. He makes all the audiences mum with his perfect screen presence. The movie has a good taste of cinematography. Kashmir is very beautifully carved in the film. The dance moves of Shahid Kapoor give you the feeling of seeing him doing the live performance. Shradhha Kapoor has been playing a pure Kashmiri girl in the movie. The film had received 5 filmfare awards for its work. The screenplay is good. Script is strong and so is the dialogues narrated. The film is just perfect in everything. Surely it’s not the one to be missed, you should give a try to watch. -
3.0
My review of Haider (2014) by admin
admin, 9 years agoFor me it's average movie. It's too dark and I see no entertainment value in it. As far as acting is concerned, everybody is acted well.
