Chatha Pacha

Every minute aspect about World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) wrestlers, ranging from their signature moves to their individual body dimensions, is imprinted in the memories of a generation that grew up in the 1990s. Debutant filmmaker Adhvaith Nayar’s Chatha Pacha attempts to tap into this enduring nostalgia of the WWE trump card-playing generation. On the surface, it appears the makers got a lot of it right, from replicating the signature moves of Undertaker and Rey Mysterio to recreating the mood of the wrestling ring with a local touch. Some of the fights in the ring have an unmistakable rhythm to them, which is further elevated by a few standout performers. But, scratch a little, and there emerges the shaky foundation, which could fall with even a weak kick, let alone a chokeslam.

As an audience, perhaps we underestimate the power of nostalgia done right. In what was being marketed as India’s first WWE-style wrestling movie, the makers of Chatha Pacha could easily have begun their movie as a story about a group of twenty-somethings, who start their local wrestling league just as a business idea. But the writers of the film, which includes director Advaith Nayar, decide to begin the film with a flashback of three little boys, taking on each other in their life’s first wrestling ring… their parents’ double cot.