Holding you for a ransom

Nonika Singh

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Adultery is a subject that Bollywood doesn’t quite know how to handle/tackle. Invariably you have either forgiveness epitomized   dramas or preachy sermons. Rare is a film that takes unfaithfulness as part of new social fabric, an urban anomie where cheating wives or husbands suffer from little pangs of guilt.

Not that Blackmail justifies infidelity. But it spares us both the bhaashan baaji and weepy rona dhona. Rather, it gives a new spin to extramarital ties that is at once off-centre and aligned to today’s reality. If Dharmendra-starrer Blackmail was all mush mush with lilting songs to boot that ring in our ears till date, this namesake is anything but sentimental.  

Early on in the film, Dev Kaushal (Irrfan Khan) discovers his wife Reena (Kirti Kulhari) is cheating on him. Guess what happens? Well, he neither confronts her nor dumps her. Instead he begins to blackmail her boyfriend. Atta boy, bravo, here is a brand new concept. Only if things were so simple; to plan for the actor and execute for the director! The boyfriend (Arunoday Singh) it so happens is no moneybags, only married to cash-cow (Divya Dutta). So what does he do... well there lies the rub and the crux of the story; a chain of blackmails that involves far too many men and women begins in a circuitous fashion. Net result could have been chaotic, only the director saves it from turning into a free for all. 

A quirky theme, Blackmail actually has all the ingredients to be a laugh riot; but isn’t, even though black humour and some adult jokes and references exist in fair measure. As all of Deo’s principal characters are spurred by greed, it reminds you of Anurag Kashyap’s Ugly. But if that was a hard-hitting indictment of human nature this one remains lighthearted, even when it throws in death and murders. On the sideline, to up the comic quotient we guess, there is Omi Vaidya (of Three Idiots fame). He continues to almost do what he did back then, that is play a pompous idiot. Only this time he is selling toilet paper with an ardour as if he had just invented rocket science. Most of his gags strangely fall flat.

Irrfan as sales executive in his company almost seems to be so much Dev that one can accuse him of not acting at all. Flustered (and frustrated too) as a man cheated in love and marriage and caught in a drab job, he is, like always, unfailingly apt in his demeanour, seemingly cool, calm and collected. But as his friend says Tumhare jaise hi serial killer nikalte hai, clearly here is a devious and ingeniously vicious (pervert too) mind at work. Does he get trapped in the web of his making or he hoodwinks them all ... well, watch the film to know which way the cookie crumbles. 

Suffice it is to say Blackmail isn’t your average Bollywood hungama. But does it carry enough punch and punch-lines? Sadly, not all the way through.  Sardonic humour works in fits and starts; at times most delectably and at others it’s too convenient to be quixotic. If Deo was unabashed in his toilet humour spruced Delhi Belly, here he reaches for a veneer while exploring marital relationships. Overall the film leaves you with a feeling of a novel idea not quite finding firm feet. Despite a clutch of talented actors the otherwise hat ke film remains at best watchable. A pity for beyond cheating and swindling spouses is a whole world of possibilities that lay untapped. And more than Dev and his targets you end up feeling cheated, if not manipulated. 

An  impressive scream-fest 

Johnson Thomas

Survival against all odds is what horror genre films deem to project and in the process the escape act becomes the reason for thrills galore. Actor-director John Krasinski, though, strives for much more than mere endurance or subsistence in his A Quiet Place, which plays on sound to generate its fear quotient. He goes further than most genre directors would and his onscreen victims are not just surviving, they are in the process of turning it all around for the foreseeable future.

The film opens up silently with its characters - the Abbot family consisting of Lee (Krasinski) his wife Evelyn (Emily Blunt) and their three children, the oldest, a hard-of-hearing preteen, Regan (Millicent Simmonds), Marcus (Noah Jupe ) and the youngest son (Cade Woodward), padding around barefoot in an abandoned supermarket. The kids are allowed to roam around freely and the parents don't seem to be bothered much that they could put everything at risk. It's not a very well-constructed sequence because the plotting shows up the adults as careless and irresponsible; and the kids appear a little too wilful and stubborn even in the face of grave impending danger. A few minutes after they step out, it's clear that the first kill is about to happen. But that's about the most unaccomplished and contrived that the film can get. Thereafter Krasinski settles into a rhythm to carve out a humdinger of great tension, dread and terror.

The monsters, as you might have guessed by now, are driven by sound, not sight. So the Abbots' survival depends entirely on their ability to blend in with the natural sounds without calling attention to themselves. It's a task fraught with risk and Lee does his best to keep the surviving members of his family, protectively ensconced and fortified. But their artificially enforced silence was obviously not meant to last. 

The tempo picks up steam after the first attack and thereafter it's only a matter of time before it reaches a scream-worthy crescendo. An innovative and supremely effective sound design allows for greater impact. Sharp edits, crisp direction, an affecting background score, and relatable cinematography make the mayhem plausibly intense. 

Krasinski and the child actors do their jobs with efficient earnestness, but it's Blunt who carries the film. Krasinski doesn't resort to hackneyed moments or tired genre tropes to serve out the thrills here. Instead, he deploys a visual cadenza that delineates sound from the context. The characters can't yell or warn each other of danger. Regan can't even hear the monster until it gets close enough. It's a scenario fraught with danger and it's palpably incipient. A Quiet Place is a fairly intelligent and vigorously involving scream-fest - one that makes you sit up and take notice!