Entrainment develops during the adiabatic synergy of components such as air and water, and it can also emerge during boiling and condensation. The interface is the physical border that allows specific entities to be exchanged between gas and liquid phases which is commonly known as interfacial phenomenon (Rana et al. in Langmuir 31:9870–9881, 2015; Rana et al. in Chem Eng Sci 161:316–328, 2017; Rana et al. in Chem Eng Sci 168:41–54, 2017; Rana et al. in Phys Fluids 28, 2016; Sharma et al. in In Proc. Indian Natl. Sci. Acad. 82:1293–1301, 2016; Sahoo et al. in Phys Fluids 34, 2022; Rana et al. in Multiph Sci Technol 28:173–191, 2016; Dhabekar et al. in European Journal of Mechanics-B/Fluids 100:52–66, 2023; Sahoo et al. in Langmuir 38:14,891–14,908, 2022). The layer of stability between phases that allows for the progressive transmission of enclosed entities established as the outcome of a particular emphasis on the predominant influence is the location, where it primarily emerges. The present investigation deals with cusp-induced air entrainment because of forward and reverse horizontal crossflow employed in air medium only. Here, we allocated a solid roller placed in between the interface of the gas–liquid fluid pair and 50% of the roller is submerged in liquid. For this investigation, we have chosen an open-source Gerris software that follows the VOF (volume of fluid) method for reorientation of the interface. This investigation demonstrates the alteration in the interfacial dynamics and steady wrapping film thickness due to these forward and backward horizontal crossflows. A non-dimensional number, Reynolds number \(\left({Re}_{flow}\right)\) , has been used to express horizontal crossflow of gaseous medium. In the present investigation, we displayed velocity vector diagram for both forward and backward horizontal crossflows to analyze the flow patterns near the roller. Finally, we proposed a scaling analysis to identify discrepancy in steady liquid film thickness number \(\left({T}_{h}^{*}\right)\) and steady air entrained thickness number \(\left({T}_{H}^{*}\right)\) with characteristics angular position \(\left({\theta }^{*}\right)\) .