Hush Hush review: Juhi Chawla, Soha Ali Khan thriller is a good premise wasted | Web Series
Proper from its first teaser trailer, Prime Video’s latest thriller Hush Hush gave off robust Massive Little Lies vibes. Each are exhibits about feminine high-society buddies embroiled in a scandal not of their very own selecting. However that’s the place the similarities finish. Massive Little Lies was a powerhouse, taking a easy plot and telling it in a compelling method. Hush Hush takes the opposite route by taking a promising premise, setting it up superbly, after which dropping the plot utterly in a fashion that’s simply befuddling. With all of the expertise and promise it incorporates, and the glimpses of masterful storytelling early on, it finally ends up turning into a tragic story of ‘what may have been’. (Additionally learn: Hush Hush trailer: Juhi Chawla, Soha Ali Khan and their gang of wealthy women give max Massive Little Lies vibes)
Set in posh Gurgaon, Hush Hush follows 4 quick buddies, energy dealer Ishi Sanghamitra (Juhi Chawla), former journalist Saiba (Soha Ali Khan), clothier Zaira (Shahana Goswami), and homemaker Dolly (Kritika Kamra). After an untoward incident at a celebration, they discover their lives are spiralling uncontrolled as they’re thrust in the course of a criminal offense that could be too huge for them to understand. As they attempt to save themselves, scorching on their heels is a great cop Geeta Tehlan (Karishma Tanna) and a few mysterious shady males. The premise, setting, and tenor of the present are all contemporary and new. The all-female forged and crew choice doesn’t really feel like a gimmick in any respect. All the pieces suits proper into place, however solely to start with.
Hush Hush takes a operating begin. It units up the characters, their backstories, equations with each other, and complicated subplots all relatively superbly. Three-four episodes in, you might be actually invested into the thriller and ready for it to unravel. Tanuja Chandra brings her expertise of directing classics equivalent to Dushman and Sangharsh, lending it to the lengthy format fairly nicely. However the payoff by no means arrives. As a substitute of the thriller, your entire present unravels, or relatively implodes on itself.
In any good thriller, the unfastened threads ought to come collectively and converge upon a single point of interest for some form of decision. In Hush Hush, they additional department out as an alternative. It appeared that after some time, the storytellers have been extra focussed on leaving as many issues unanswered as potential to arrange a number of cliffhangers for a possible season 2. That may all the time be a welcome factor however the plot does want to return collectively earlier than all that. There must be some payoff, some decision of feelings and storylines in a seven-episode arc. The quite a few pink herrings and sub plots start to look like distractions as a result of a lot of them, fairly frankly, appear to have no connection to the characters or their motivations.
The factor that works for Hush Hush is its setting within the ultra-posh Golf Course Street of Gurgaon, the place the wealthy, highly effective, and mighty of India reside. The affluence and the affect of the characters and the starkness of violence in the course of it units up the shock superbly. Anyone with some familiarity with the area would recognize it extra. However even those that have by no means set foot in Delhi-NCR will establish how the place is nearly a character–a illustration of decadent energy within the story.
The performances assist too. Juhi Chawla, in her OTT debut, tries exhausting with no matter little she has been given. It’s an sincere efficiency if not a strong one. She will by no means create the aura that her character calls for however actually brings the vulnerability it wants. Her fellow 90s Bollywood heroine Ayesha Jhulka is her good foil. The scenes involving the 2 actors are among the many finest. Soha Ali Khan and Kritika Kamra come by means of superbly as nicely, splendidly depicting how high-society residing could be a lure for girls. Shahana, I felt, was dealt a uncooked hand with a personality so underdeveloped that she was at an obstacle as in comparison with the opposite protagonists. Karishma Tanna because the Haryanvi cop is plausible and likable regardless of a fluctuating accent that’s at finest distracting, at worst annoying. Aside from the primary forged, veterans Benjamin Gilani and Vibha Chhibber shine by means of briefly however highly effective roles.
Hush Hush falters as a result of it’s uncertain what it desires to be or desires to say. It’s, at instances, a commentary on the highly effective and corrupt in India. At different instances, it’s a mirror of the depravity within the nation’s ultra-rich. And at its core, it is usually a whodunnit. The difficulty is that the present can’t multitask. So, the second it tries to play up one facet, one other suffers. Complete threads and sub plots are deserted for episodes, characters are launched with out context, and characters behave out of character slightly too usually and conveniently. As I stated, it’s a tragic, little case of ‘what if’ and ‘what may have been’. It feels even worse as a result of in elements, it does fulfill that preliminary promise, however solely barely. The talent–both in entrance of the digital camera and behind–deserved higher. As will we all.
Sequence: Hush Hush
Director: Tanuja Chandra
Forged: Juhi Chawla, Soha Ali Khan, Kritika Kamra, Shahana Goswami, Karishma Tanna, and Ayesha Jhulka.
