Pagglait Movie Review: Top-notch tele-drama

PagglaitUA Drama comedyDir Umesh BistON NetflixCast Sanya Malhotra Ashutosh Rana Sheeba ChadhaRating Basically the young protagonist of this movie mdash the character on whom the story is centred mdash is someone we never see on screen Because hersquos dead Hersquos talked about in practically every scene But we hardly know much about him as an individual or how he passed away as well To the best of my observation there isnrsquot a single representational image of his either Which is a neat touch actuallyWhat do we know for sure That there is his funeral Which in a sense for most people is the opposite of a wedding Meaning yoursquore once again the star of a friends plus relativesrsquo show Except this time yoursquore no moreWatch VideoAs with weddings again itrsquos not like all guestsattendees are equally engaged with whatrsquos going on But together they manage to create a certain lsquomahaulrsquo mood suitable to the momentSo does this movie actually And for this besides a competent ensemble cast a mix of fine newbies and veterans like Ashutosh Rana Sheeba Chadha Raghubir Yadav the credit must entirely go to the writerdirector Umesh BistMuch like its title suggests Pagglait a very UPBihar slang for a crazy one is a Small Town Drama No we shall not abbreviate that to STD And like with so many Hindi movies majority of them like this one set in Uttar Pradesh during winters it gets the lehja and bolchaal general sense of being of the characters so right mdash you can enjoy the film for the atmospherics aloneThe wedding analogy is also relevant because the deceased here was newly married The focus is on his wife of five months whorsquos the young widow now Donrsquot know if yoursquove seen the promo of this picture yet If you have Irsquod suggest that you lsquounseersquo it before clicking on the filmBecause the trailer sets this up as a comedy of manners Given that the young widow is in no mood to mourn her husbandrsquos loss He wasnrsquot close to her after all This is really the first maybe 15 minutes of the film It seems like a premise of sorts But really where could you possibly take it from there A whole lot of places surely But this film certainly doesnrsquot make any attempt at being OTT funny mdash in a Small Town Drama like Badhaai Ho 2018 or Shubh Mangal Saavdhan 2017 sorta way It is in fact deliberately subdued totally somber mdash smoothly sailing at its own sweet paceThe rhythm and beats in fact are wholly modern television like You sense a lack of dramatic highs and lows or concrete cinematic moments as it were Which suits an OTTNetflix releaseplatform just fineDealing with death and life of loved ones left behind it could have taken a route similar to the recent TV series The Married Woman on ZEE5 also produced by Ekta Kapoor as this Which I highly recommend just for how edgy that show is and just as underratedOr it couldrsquove totally dumbed down to the level of squabbling relatives in a caricature of a desi family dealing with kitchensink politics There is a slight element of all of the aboveWhere the film manages to stay afloat with much aplomb though is turning all of this into a comingofage story of the young widow whose life changes within the span of the 13 days it takes for the soul to exit a home That is if yoursquore a believer of course Reminds me mdash the fact that his name was Aastik believer is all we really know about the dead man in this movieAt the centre of it all is Sanya Malhotra playing the young widow How tough is this part for an actor whorsquos usually hired to express emotions Her part expressly demands that she feel nothing Because thatrsquos really what her character feels How do you do that without crutches of lines props movement action only backstory and a bunch of relatively hyper blokes to play withThere is a solid selfassured stillness to Sanya on screen that I suspect is a rare superskill set of its own You saw a touch of that in Anurag Basursquos Ludo 2020 Way more of it in Ritesh Batrarsquos Photograph 2019 which was diametrically opposite to her cranky role in Vishal Bhardwajrsquos Pataakha 2018She made her debut as the secondthird lead in Dangal 2016 and has since scripted an unusual but memorable filmography already I could watch her on screen for a couple of hours while she seemingly does so little mdash yet manages to hold your attention through and through Thatrsquos what you do in Pagglait and you arenrsquot disappointed at all