Well worth a satire

 

chandraprakash Dwivedi distinguished himself with his two maiden efforts, Chanakya on TV and Pinjar on the big screen. So, expectations from his second feature film were certainly high. Zed Plus is a highly engaging attempt at socio-political satire with humour-laden benefits all along the route. The script has its sublime moments. Unfortunately, the plotting is not altogether believable. 

Set in contemporary India, Fatehpur, a small town in Rajasthan famous for its Peepal wale Peer ki Dargah, where prayers are answered and wishes are granted if the one asking has a pure heart. There is neighbourhood conflict between two friends Aslam (Adil Hussain), a puncture repair-wala, and Habib (Mukesh Tiwari), an aspiring poet, both married and yet seeking illicit liaisons with Sayeeda (Ekavalli Khanna), a pretty widow. Aslam scores and that leaves him open to Habib’s acts of jealousy. Amidst this internecine chaos enters the Prime Minister, seeking panacea for all his political problems. He is down on a visit to the famous Dargah with his principal secretary (KK Raina) in tow. Aslam is the Khadim at the holy shrine on the day of the PM’s visit, so he gets a chance to ask for a favour from the PM and what he gets instead is Zed Plus security, round-the-clock, which, though it provides him and his family with better respect and improved lifestyle, also curbs his freedom to sneak out in the middle of the night to engage with his illicit lover. Frustrated by the many hindrances, he becomes prey to a rival party’s shenanigans. As things start heating up politically, Abdul realises there’s much more worthwhile in the simple life that he was once bent on escaping. 

The pacing is even and the plotting quite remunerative in terms of laughs. There’s plenty of wry, diabolic humour to be had here. It’s only when the proceedings get far-fetched that you start to lose interest midway. But, Dwivedi is quick to make the impossible look somewhat plausible and with strong support from this excellent bunch of ensemble actors, he is able to make even the most ridiculous sequences look somewhat convincing. Kulbhushan Kharbanda, who plays a South-Indian PM who has a penchant for speaking in English, sets up an interesting contrast against the largely Hindi-speaking characters he comes in contact with during his trip to Fatehpur. The politics is played out pretty energetically, but the friends-turned-foes-turned-friends’ gambit towards the endplay sticks out a little, because there’s very little development towards that goal. The use of Kashmir as the metaphor that galvanises aggression and appeasement between two foes and references to Pakistan, play on a dual level in the complex and intelligently engineered narrative. The two-hour, twenty-minute runtime does make the engagement a little bit exhausting, but the superior performances, the smart scripting and the canny dialogues make it all fruitful and worthy.