Badla

“The beauty of this revenge saga lies in the subtle complexities of details, the complex oscillatory squabble between a lawyer and his client”

It’s not a fight onto death kind of revenge story neither is this nail-biting kind of suspense thriller that has the capability to inject the unnerving dose of fantods. The beauty of this revenge saga lies in the subtle complexities of details, the complex oscillatory repartee or a squabble between a lawyer and his client.

Okay! I concede, not entirely in the complexities of the squabble… the real beauty of the film also lies in the superlative nuances of performances exhibited by the lead characters.

it is exemplary as to how the charismatic presence of one man can keep you hooked up to your seat even in a seemingly interminable and repetitious verbal sequence. Yes, of course, the only precondition is that the man should have the persona of Amitabh Bachchan and nothing less.

In short, the story of the movie is that Naina Sethi, a successful business woman gets entangled in a crime plot pertaining to killing of her lover where she is the main suspect with all evidence stacked strictly against her.

Badal Gupta the ace lawyer who hasn’t lost a case in his entire career of forty years has the pretentious job of proving her innocence. Badal begins by extracting the truth directly from the horse’s mouth. The story then unfolds to the viewer as the complex verbal game of narration and extraction of the truth ensues between the two.

The plot, to an alert viewer, had only a shade of unpredictability, a very fine one but then that’s ok as long as the running frame has the capacity to keep you hinged. Few sequences especially the one in which Mr Badal starts considering the story in reverse order gave it a nice twist and deserve a special mention.

The characters themselves suffered from paucity of characterisation but considering the fact they had to deliver themselves in confined space with limited armamentarium, you can give it a pass.

For a storyline of this nature, trending into the domain of realism, the final twist, the climax, should be held on a firm premise of conviction, which I found lacking in this case.

The film is shot on beautiful locales providing it a magnificent canvas and the performances of the supporting cast especially that of Amrita Singh was well worth their efforts.

Verdict

Pick of the lot today. Must watch.