'Caught Out' Web Review: Indian match-making (of another type)!

Film Caught OutGenre DocumentaryDirector Supriya SobtiGuptaOn NetflixRating 35Itrsquos not mere coincidence that the biggest scandal in Indian if not world cricket history wasnrsquot strictly speaking broken by an allaccess sports journalistAniruddha Bahal was practically filling in for the sports reporter when he uncovered lsquomatchfixingrsquo going on in cricket mdash with a coverstory in Outlook mid1997 Meaning players were not just passing on crucial matchinfo to bookmakers but also taking orders for how the match will play outAround this time as we learn from Supriya SobtiGuptarsquos Netflix documentary Caught Out it was common to hear journalists converse with bookies from the press boxThis shared secrecycomplicity isnrsquot surprising Itrsquos the bane of beat reporting where you eventually get so close to your sourcessubjects mdash in turn like the Icarus before the sun they destroy your very reason of existenceBahalrsquos coverstory had cricketer Manoj Prabhakar for a whistleblower By then Prabhakarrsquos career was over mdash dropped after 1996 World Cup Surely he had a bone to pick mdash which source doesnrsquot But he didnrsquot name names thenHe did that later for Bahalrsquos documentary made for the newly launched Tehelka magazine This is where Prabhakar accused Kapil Dev of offering him money to drop a match Over six weeks Prabhakar stung colleaguesfriends who revealed even more supposedly lsquooff the recordrsquoThis doc Fallen Heroes produced by Minty Tejpal mdash shot with spy cams at an unprecedented scale then mdash is the film within Caught Out Bahal has nearly pioneered this sort of brave undercover reporting since mdash including blowing the political cover of legacy newsmedia itselfCaught Out is SobtiGuptarsquos directorial debut Although she is herself in many ways a recent firstmover to this lsquoNetflix genrersquo of entertaining docs if you may mdash relooking at wellreported events going deeper into its coverage and given the distance of time coming out with a perspective that daily journalism for its deadlines is incapable of Think of it as the second draft of historyThatrsquos what she helped script working on Mumbai Mafia MM 2023 which takes a vulturersquos eye view of the rsquo90s Bombay underworld As with Bad Boy Billionaires BB 2020 on bigticket financial scams mdash although her segment in the anthology on Satyamrsquos Ramalinga Raju is still stuck in courtOf course such a smartly packaged narrative shot and dramatised with pizzazz mdash for a new audience across almost 200 countries mdash bears the possibility of libellitigationOnly because an old wound is being scratched There is practically no fresh piece of evidencereporting to be sure This isnrsquot quite like say the exploratoryrevelatory Bryan Fogelrsquos Icarus 2017 on doping in cyclingBut itrsquos enough for a giant like Netflix to take it easy play it safe mdash keep the film almost under wraps for its members to automatically discover the content on their app Algorithm is the sole advertising So with Caught Out or BBB and MM As it is one guesses bigger audiences are possibly with more floozy reality entertainment such as Sima Auntyrsquos Indian Matchmaking or even The Romantics Yashraj Filmsrsquo hagiography for that matterSpeaking of which ldquomaking a matchrdquo or matchmaking is precisely what the accused Mohammad Azharuddin India captain 199099 allegedly told the CBI about exactly what was happening upon bookiesrsquo instructionsAzhar got banned from cricket subsequent to the said confession He fought against that judgement in court even got exonerated He made a crappy cricket film called Azhar 2016 for celebrationEither way matchfixing as it turns out isnrsquot a crime thatrsquoll send you to prison Why sportsbetting is idiotically a criminal offense in India deserves a more thorough legislative debate Itrsquos something SobtiGuptarsquos film couldrsquove touched upon For subtext the film reveals two facts so essential that yoursquore almost certain nothingrsquos gonna changeOne that ldquolove for moneyrdquo or money itself is ldquoaddictiverdquo Two ldquothe gambler never wins the bookie never losesrdquo Public reshaming like Caught Out I guess is important deterrence mdash to prevent corrupt practices such as matchspotfixing in sport like insider and horsetrading in business and politics Public memoryrsquos shortSobtiGupta does an even fairer job of bringing fine journalists to the fore with her doc Theyrsquore likely to be the best sniffer dogs in such cases Most of them remain so simultaneously underpaid and unsung that the incentives seldom match the potential riskFelt the same with Alex Perry in MM mdash did not know it was his profile of cop Pradeep Sharma in Time magazine that led the Indian government to rethink the issue of lsquoencounter copsrsquo as a laudable forceLikewise Bahal is the hero of Caught Out My midday colleague Clayton Murzello is specially thanked in the closing credits Personally Irsquove followed the matchfixing scandal in Indian cricket chiefly through its strongest chronicler sports journalist Pradeep MagazineAlso Read Gulmohar movie review A moving feastHe was among the first to broach the subject in printpublic His book Not Just Cricket reveals obvious ldquotossfixingrdquo by Pakistani cricketer Asif Iqbal in the 197980 IndoPak Test Thatrsquos how old the rot is Magazine shouldrsquove been profiled in Caught OutAlso looking at cricket since the 2000 Hansie Cronje Azhar Ajay Sharma exposeacute mdash for Godrsquos sake wersquove had IPL with capitalistopportunists owning cricket teams with no stake in the game The hearsay on this world is horribleSobtiGupta ought to have looked there Thatrsquos the obvious sequel How wide can you cover in an hourplus doc anyway Well delivered though

'Caught Out' Web Review: Indian match-making (of another type)!

Film: Caught Out
Genre: Documentary
Director: Supriya Sobti-Gupta
On: Netflix
Rating: 3/5

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Home / Entertainment / Web Series / Article / 'Caught Out' Web Review: Indian match-making (of another type)!

'Caught Out' Web Review: Indian match-making (of another type)!

Film: Caught OutGenre: DocumentaryDirector: Supriya Sobti-GuptaOn: NetflixRating: 3/5

Trending Stories

Latest Photos

Latest Videos

Latest Web Stories

Mid-Day Fast

Film: Caught Out
Genre: Documentary
Director: Supriya Sobti-Gupta
On: Netflix
Rating: 3/5