Murder Mubarak

You are reminded of Hercule Poirot when Bhavani Singh (Pankaj Tripathi), Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) comes to investigate death of a fitness trainer in a fictitious club in Delhi (Royal Delhi Club or RDC). Autopsy reveals traces of a drug and an apparent accident transforms into a murder. What follows is development of the plot by revealing dark secrets of everyone’s lives and finally telling the audience who the actual murderer was. The rest of the star studded cast consist of veteran actors such as Dimple Kapadia, Sanjay Kapoor, Karishma Kapoor, Tisca Chopra and present generation guys such as Vijay Varma and Sara Ali Khan. 

While the architecture and interiors of Royal Delhi Club transport you to a regal era, you will find yourself wondering who would have committed a heinous crime such as murder in such a pristine place, whose members are all rich and belong to higher sections of the society. Slight comic element has been brought in when Pankaj Tripathi refers to weird tales about his deputy during investigation.

Sara Ali Khan looks good but she really needs to work on her acting and dialogue delivery, although she shines in some scenes. The kleptomaniac nature of her character is not utilized in the film whereas the script for other characters could have been better. The film relies on Vijay Varma and Pankaj Tripathi.

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Khufiya

An intelligence agency has identified an internal mole, and wishes to nab him red handed. The intent is also to identify the reason – catch the puppet and puppeteer both. The film is led by Tabu, an actress par excellence. She is not making any attempt to hide her age. Along with her senior officer (Ashish Vidyarthi), she embarks on a journey to uncover the prime suspect, Ravi Mohan, played by Ali Zafar. I have seen him on screen after a very long time and I totally loved Ali’s bespectacled look.

Wamiqa Gabbi comes across a very strong actress too. I had seen her in a small role in Mai, a web series starring Sakshi Tanwar. I have observed her in a TV commercial and in yet another very successful web series (Jubilee). Wamiqa has definitely travelled a long way to reach her present level of acting.

Tabu and her team are surprised to learn that it is not his wife, but his aged mother, who is Ravi’s accomplice in crime. The storyline is tight, and full of twists and turns till the very end. The mission behaves like a sine curve, troughs happen when Ravi manages to smuggle sensitive information across to a rival country, and crests can be sensed when you have him cornered; till he manages to flee again. The fact that everyone has to balance their personal and professional lives is underlined yet again. An extra flavour is added in this thriller for me as quite a few dialogues are spoken in Bengali. You'll love Khufiya also because of the directional excellence of Vishal Bhardwaj.

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Dhootha: The Messenger

Have you come across a series that makes you wish you had not started it at all? Well, Dhootha, a Telegu web series, dubbed in multiple languages, was the first of this kind for me. I would say the faint hearted should not watch it at all – there’s lot of blood and ugly deaths. Also, paranormal activity is something that fails to appeal me.

The basic idea is acceptable – one should be honest towards his profession and not succumb to political pressure and greed. Heinous crimes lead to the death of an honest journalist, who was a man of principles. Thereafter, his spirit takes on the onus to teach corrupt journalists their lessons in the hard way.

Naga Chaitanya is a handsome man and has portrayed his character (Sagar) very well. He carries the series on his shoulders. The insensitive trait of Sagar comes across strongly during his final interaction with his secretary (Prachi Desai). But what she did in revenge was way more awful. The director shows no consideration for audience and portrays crimes and deaths in realistic manner. You may end up spending nights uneasily after watching gory scenes.

Plus points: Absolutely perfect cast: Everyone seems to tailor made for their roles. Direction, Story build-up, connecting the dots are good. 

Only negative is that there seems to be too much blood. And I thought couple of deaths, especially that of the Youtuber, could have been reduced.

So brace yourself, and then watch the horror series.

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