New Delhi, April 5 -- Recent Bollywood blockbusters like Dhurandhar (2025) and Dhurandar (2026), have triggered intense debate about whether cinema is shaping public understanding of the state, power, and even foreign policy. The reactions, especially around Dhurandhar, reveal a deeper anxiety: are we beginning to read films as factual representations of political reality? That would be a mistake.

Cinema is not a policy document. It does not explain the state; it performs it. Yet, to dismiss films entirely would be equally flawed. As Satyajit Ray once suggested in a different context, "Cinema's characteristic forte is its ability to capture and communicate the intimacies of the human mind." It is precisely in these intimacies, in the min...