Priyanka Roy

Samar Mehra is not a has-been actor. His career never took off and at 50, acting opportunities have shrunk considerably, and so have his relationship prospects. Samar — played by an almost opaque Bobby Deol, a necessity for the part and not an encumbrance — sustains by lip-syncing to his old hits (C’mon baby, with him looking like a shiny disco ball, is addictive) at weddings and entertains himself by being on a dating app. His rent is overdue, so is surgery for a bad back. Unmarried, his current on-off date is Khushi (a refreshing Saba Azad). Cynical and exhausted, one night Samar finds his life upended when cops unceremoniously land up and herd him off to jail. A disbelieving and distraught Samar learns that he has been accused of rape by Gayatri (Sapna Pabbi), a woman he claims he had right-swiped on, got intimate with a few times and ghosted when she got obsessive. But in a post #MeToo society skewed against the man in such cases — “I am a victim,” Samar laments. “You are the accused until proven innocent,” his lawyer (Riddhi Sen is solidly cast) says bluntly — he finds that the stakes are heavily stacked against him.

Seven episodes of Brown later, I couldn’t help but make my way to a place I never visit: ChatGPT. I keyed in a series of prompts which looked exactly like this: Serial killer + Murder mystery + Kolkata + Anglo-Indian community + Alcoholic and troubled cop + Food + Rabindrasangeet + Noir feel + Shadowy spaces + Kolkata landmarks + Sepia frames. In less than five seconds, I was staring at a plot uncannily similar to what I had just watched. It had even suggested a title for the story: “Sepia Nights”. ‘Sepia’ is, of course, described as “a deep reddish-brown colour”. ‘Brown’ is the operative word here. Before you rap my knuckles for venturing even close to AI, Brown has already beaten me to it. The series, now streaming on ZEE5, is nothing more than an algorithmic amalgamation of everything that Kolkata is. More importantly, it shows more of what Kolkata isn’t. Granted that Brown is a serial-killer thriller and not a geography lesson. But for a story that relies so much on atmospherics, it is a shame that director Abhinay Deo, along with his team of writers (Suri Gopalan, Diggi Sissodia, Sunayana Kumari and Mayukh Ghosh) choose to present the city through such a stereotypical, trite lens.

As a society, when we can’t put women in a box, we often use a predictable and largely over-used term to describe them — messy. The word, somehow, acts as an all-encompassing crutch to encapsulate everything about these women that we can’t put a finger on. In small-town India (though that may be a limiting demographic to cite on our part), a woman who not only refuses to be helpless, fragile or vulnerable, but also cocks a snook at so-called community norms is often branded a “daayan”. That is the description that Rekha has had to live with all her life. A sensation among her (male) neighbours ever since she stepped into Adarsh Colony as a young bride, Rekha’s sleeveless blouses, come-hither looks and bold walk and talk (read: the desire to be a single, independent woman who derides judgment and doesn’t feel the need to explain herself or her actions) has given rise to loose talk, unfounded suspicion and strong rumours that she not only preys on men sexually, but also makes quick work of them, the urban legend being that their skeletons are stashed beneath the bed of marigolds in her garden.

n a market and year where Hollywood tentpole has been dominant — think Project Hail Mary, think Michael, think The Devil Wears Prada 2, led by the biggest so far, namely, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie — the last few weeks have seen film buffs worldwide defy every kind of algorithm, glossy packaging and blockbuster potential, to troop into cinemas worldwide for a film which has quickly become what one can only describe as a “phenomenon”. Horror is having a moment on the Holly screen, and Obsession — to quote an unavoidable cliche — is now an obsession.

What ails legal thrillers in the Hindi language space? A lot of other problems apart, it is what the genre refers to as the “gotcha” surprise evidence trope. In film after film — the frequency alone merits this sweeping generalisation — we get to see dramatic, last-second reveals of secret witnesses or documents that swing a case in a way that is all too convenient, and therefore, feels manipulative. It is enough to make audiences feel cheated, especially if you have remained invested in the proceedings up to that point. The problem (or not, depending on which side of the attention divide you have been on) with System is that the film, in its entirety, is based on so much contrivance that by the time you arrive at the “rabbit out of a hat” moment, you simply don’t care. If you are smart — and more importantly, if you somehow manage to push yourself and remain engaged enough during its 123-minute running time — you would have anyway figured out the “twist” long before it happens. In fact, you would have eye-rolled your way through it.

Pulkit ventures into familiar territory — casteism in the hinterland, corruption in the system and a lone wolf battling it all — in his latest film Kartavya. The filmmaker, who prefers to remain mononymous, has touched upon all the above themes in his much-acclaimed 2024 film Bhakshak, one which had Bhumi Pednekar fighting against all odds as an intrepid journalist in small-town India who takes on the powers-that-be to uncover a girl trafficking racket. Bhakshak, which was clearly based on the Muzaffarpur shelter case, was backed by Shah Rukh Khan’s Red Chillies Entertainment, as is Kartavya. Both are on Netflix.

At some point in the utter nonsense of a film called Pati Patni Aur Woh Do — calling it a comedy would be an insult to the genre — a character tells another: “Bakloli ki pratiyogita ho toh kirtimaan honge aap”. In language that you and I would perhaps understand (and, of course, I had to Google this), it means that when it comes to foolishness or clownery, the person addressed would win a competition hands down. How we wish Pati Patni Aur Woh Do was about clownery, which is an art in itself. But art, craft, skill, storytelling and everything in between is grossly missing in this Mudassar Aziz-directed film which follows the filmmaker’s own Pati Patni Aur Woh, released in 2019, starring Ananya Panday and Bhumi Pednekar, which, in many ways, benefited from Kartik Aaryan’s goofy charm (and we can’t really believe we are writing this).

Unchosen reels you in with its intriguing synopsis and makes you regret the next six hours of your life. This Netflix series — attempting to tell a story about a religious cult thrown into disarray by forces both within and outside of it — starts tepid, grows tiresome and ends tedious. Which is a major missed opportunity for creator Julie Gearey, who wastes a premise that had the potential to score with both familial drama and psychological intrigue, but falls short on both counts. And many more.