This period piece about the Hindi cinema industry in the 1950s stars Soha Ali Khan, in one of her first leading roles, as a fictional actress in the years just before the beginning of her mother’s career. The film’s love story between a frustrated auteur and an actress with a past is loosely based on the relationship between the great Guru Dutt and Waheeda Rehman. Khan plays the glamorous star from a poor and manipulative family, with Shiney Ahuja as the tortured writer. Khoya khoya chand is a valentine to a golden age in Hindi filmmaking, and Khan is a non-stop, fearless physical presence, whether singing and dancing, sword fighting on horseback or breaking down off-camera in the best tradition of the long-suffering diva. – DP