Movie Review – A Death in the Gunj

A love letter to whodunit

‘A Death in the Gunj’ is not your typical whodunit, its more of a whoisit, and to know that it takes the whole film. That’s the beauty of it. When a film opens with a couple of people starring at a dead body, all you’ll be intrigued to see in that film is who’d be killed and who’s the killer but here even though that fleeting feeling lies at the back of the mind, the story which happens around them is more intriguing and such a pleasure to watch. Wish I had worked on this film.

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As soon as I watched the film, I pinged a group saying that this is a film that we must have done. It’s that kind of film which looks to be made by a closely knit group. Because the feeling is special. Everyone understands what they need to know. The family setting somewhat reminded me of ‘Kapoor and sons’ but there was a certain bit of greatness and bigger purpose associated to it. But here in ‘A Death in the Gunj’, they are haughtily disorienting. Especially from the niceties of the world. So much so that a nice guy like Shutu (Vikrant Massey) feels out of place from their world.

We see an Anglo-Indian family going to their parent’s house in McCluskieganj for a vacation where they meet up with old friends too. Shutu feels out of place with their family right from the word go. It was beautifully done in a way that we don’t feel the family to be extremely secular as well as Shutu to be extremely inferior. It was done in a right mix so that a third person wouldn’t find much difference between Shutu and family but they’d have a vast difference. We can’t help but fall in love with the setting and the environment.

The whole film has a horror film setup and best part is that its in English. The entire essence would have been lost if it had been forcefully converted to Hindi. Like how ‘Delhi Belly’ was so ingenuine because it was in Hindi. The fact that it was a family of Anglo-Indians only helped the case. It felt like watching a play in theatre where only elite few would go. It has become a kind of social status nowadays, yet strip that of it, its still lovely. Wonder how they take these creative decisions which would suit the films. These type of decisions shows why gut feeling is more important than thinking too much.

May be if it had been made now, Kalki would have been replaced by Radhika Apte or there would be an additional character for Radhika Apte and would be released in Netflix. Because it looked like such a film. And if its an OTT release, its impossible to think without Apte. Such has been her presence. But talking about presence, how well a presence Kalki has. Mimi (Kalki Koechlin) and Vikram (Ranvir Shorey) were supposedly in love and still have a fling even though Vikram is married. Pangs of jealously crosses across both of them but both being typical alpha characters they take it upon Shutu. First Mimi uses her to make out and Vikram to make fun. Worse is they don’t realize what grave mistake they’re making.

It’s the same with rest of the family too, even with Tani (Arya Sharma) who ignores Shuntu after he leaves her and takes Mimi for a ride. Even when Tani is lost, they blame it upon him and their parents don’t feel guilty to have indulged in sexual act when she gets missing. That few seconds of silence before Bonnie (Tillotama Shome) interrupts after the servant says that she had seen Tani last when she came to give the clothes was brilliant. Till that time, Tani’s parents would be fighting but once they know that they were involved in a sexual activity at that point, they change their topic. Even the blow job scene was so casually done.

There were tons of good performance but undoubtedly Vikrant Massey scores. Like Mimi says, he’s beautiful. Such a soft guy which anyone would love to fall in love with. But ends up in a wrong place and harms himself. Throughout the film he sticks to his character and performs brilliantly. What more, he’s good looking too. He could be a great hero material.

The climax was a bit underwhelming which Konkana clarified that it’s Shutu who’s dead. Maybe it would have been better if she hadn’t clarified that. We could have thought that it’s Vikram who is dead. But the way Nandu (Gulshan Devaiah) and Brian McKenzie (Jim Sarbh) handle the corpse unemotionally it doesn’t look like the dead body is that of Vikram’s. Anyways that’s a good point to debate. I personally wouldn’t have liked Vikram to be dead. It’s too simple. Konkana’s climax of Shutu dying and his ghost being there in the backseat of car works better for me. It’s dreamy and romantic.

Movie Review – Parama

Snooze fest

The way the film started, ‘Parama’ held my attention and curiosity, both. Seeing the Bengal household reminded me of another amazing film ‘Utsab’ that I had watched sometime back. The opening was as lively as it could get with a festive background, an effervescent daughter in law who’s like an all in all in the household but her life goes to tatters party due to her mistake as well as society. The film explores what a woman goes through in this phase.

Even though the opening was beautiful, the way a female character was developed as someone godly because of the duties she does was irritating. There were ‘n’ number of movies in Tamil which has done that and still doing that. It’s not only the men who define the definition of perfect but also women. In fact, that’s dangerous. With all these I didn’t want a feel-good film of a woman who’s a wife, daughter, daughter in law etc. and do a theem thanana. So, when the film took a different angle it was a relief.

But that relief was short lived. Even though Parama (Raakhee) has an affair, the mundane nature of it was irritating. Rahul (Mukul Sharma) with whom she has an affair doesn’t really help it because of his idea of life. Having been largely outside of India, the way he sees it is totally different from her. And once he goes back the US, her life goes upside down because of one of the pictures that he had taken for a magazine.

Neither is her affair enticing nor her self-discovery entertaining. To see her undergo everything is a mere torture. If a film like this had been made by KB, it would have been so entertaining. But the mundanity of this film spoilt the feel. Other than this I don’t have anything more to even write about the film. Sometimes if films are too practical it ends up as boring as life.