Killer Soup review: Manoj Bajpayee, Konkona Sensharma serve a bland broth – The Indian Express
A pitch-black comedy, garnished by ‘paya’ soup over a dream serving of Manoj Bajpayee and Konkona Sensharma, and dressed with homicide and mayhem? Signal me up already, I’d thought gleefully after I heard of 2024’s new internet collection, ‘Killer Soup’, directed by Abhishek Chaubey. And it crushes me to say this, however this concoction, which promised a lot flavour and freshness, solely bubbled up for me intermittently.
First, the plus factors. The picturesque setting, in a small city near Madurai known as Mainjur, is ideal for a twisty story dotted with dodgy characters and dodgier doings. Husband-and-wife duo Swathi (Konkona Sensharma) and Prabhakar aka Prabhu Shetty (Manoj Bajpayee) are in the midst of what looks like a everlasting argument, her dreaming of a restaurant of her personal, him making an attempt to determine how one can get out of a multi-crore ‘ghapla’. Prabhu’s older brother, the street-smart, foul-mouthed Arvind Shetty (Saiyaji Shinde) is of no assist, holding the household purse-strings shut, and his art-loving daughter Apeksha aka Apu (Anula Navelkar) even nearer, refusing to let her comply with her coronary heart. Arvind’s long-time factotum, the gravelly-voiced Lucas (Lal), is aware of the place the skeletons are buried, and is a keeper of previous secrets and techniques.
It looks like an awesome set-up for a fly within the soup. Or a number of. A jovial non-public eye, brandishing a digital camera, clicks incriminating pictures. Blackmail is within the air. Prabhu’s lookalike, the squint-eyed masseuse Umesh Pillai (Manoj Bajpayee, in a double position), turns up on the flawed time within the flawed place. Our bodies begin piling up. Beady-eyed senior Inspector Hassan (Nasser) arrives on the scene, together with sturdy constable Asha (Shilpa Mudbi) and keen beginner Thupalli (Anbuthasan) and stirs issues up. Who’s that mysterious girl in a burkha? The place is the lacking digital camera? Whose physique is in that grave the place the glittering fire-flies swarm?
It could seem to be so much, however over eight 45-50 minutes episodes, these plot factors — apparently based mostly on a real-life case — dissipate in writing that’s principally flat and sometimes convoluted. Quirk is nice when it’s intrinsic to the characters and adorns the story-telling, however right here it feels grafted on. Watching this, I flash-backed to the pleasant quirky touches in Chaubey’s ‘Ishqiya’ and ‘Dedh Ishqiya’: had been there too many cooks right here?
The entire thought of a black ‘comedy’ is that it’s meant to be humorous, and that it makes you chortle, regardless of your self, however right here I stored ready for the laughs. I additionally stored ready for shockers, additionally an important black comedy part, however the proceedings bob alongside placidly. The place’s the urgency? Or the strain? Why is the Hyderabadi ‘khansama’ such an exaggerated word? Why, in truth, this obsession with badly-made ‘paya’ soup? We by no means actually discover out. And why, most crucially, don’t the uber-talented Bajpayee and Sensharma spark collectively? By rights, they need to have set the display ablaze.
Some detailing does have impression, particularly when new faces present up. So most of the characters talking in Tamil, simply as they’d naturally, is a terrific contact. I additionally sat up every time Kalaripayattu professional Kirtima (Kani Kusruti, superb) confirmed as much as demand her pound of flesh that weakened when confronted by her low-backed blouses. Or when the headstrong Apu, performed by an efficient Navlekar, tears into her dad who’s incapable of talking with out abusing his moms and sisters, a jarring word as a result of it carries on for much too lengthy: Shinde and Bajpayee labored along with extra efficacy within the 1999 cop drama ‘Shool’.
ALSO READ | How Shekhar Kapur knocked some sense into ‘penniless’ Manoj Bajpayee with ‘exhausting questions’: ‘How will you help your loved ones, what when you fall in poor health?’
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Essentially the most glorious Nasser stored yanking me again into the thick of issues simply by being there. His old-timey cop who gained’t cease, who is aware of when to make use of a slap, and how one can meet a plank good, measuring his size on the ground, is a delight. He’s droll and sharp, as required, and the most effective a part of this bland broth.
Killer Soup solid: Manoj Bajpayee, Konkona Sensharma, Nasser, Sayaji Shinde, Kani Kusruti, Lal, Anula Navlekar, Jasir, Rajeev Ravindranathan, Anbuthasan, Vaishali Bisht, Shilpa Mudbi
Killer Soup director: Abhishek Chaubey
Killer Soup score: 2 stars
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