Ahmad-Imran

Javed Sheikh, the most prolific serial killer of the Indian subcontinent, abducted, raped, and killed 100 children, then dismembered and dissolved their bodies in acid before draining them into the local river.

So, a movie based on such a person has a lot of options and opportunities to explore the usual modus operandi, the details and gore of the crimes themselves, the motives and psyche of the criminal, or the failure of the society and system where hundreds of kids went missing unnoticed and no efforts were made to find them or to probe the reason.

Kukri does neither of these. The writing is lazy; even the Wikipedia page about Javed has more structure and research. The whole cast hams throughout the film, so much so that a street play performance would appear as subtle and nuanced. Nothing worth noticing on the technical side either.

This must be the most unmotivated and uninspired filmmaking I have come across.

It is a metaphor for women in their workplaces. If you think it is too over the top and exaggerated, ask the women around you (girlfriends/wives/friends), and they'll tell you that it could easily be passed for any corporate offices in any of the metropolitan, at least their fear and constant guard. Places where women are constantly objectified, harassed, discriminated against, and preyed upon. The men in sharp suits and pleasant demeanors are not too different from the seemingly barbaric and boorish miners of the royal hotel, who are so ignorant that they don't know the difference between harassment and harmless flirting, and the concept of consent is alien to them. Any of them can be a potential sex offender - a molester or, worse, a rapist. To survive in this world, women have to constantly watch their moves, read their intentions, and carefully choose (curate and refine) their own actions, words, and even body language so as not to unintentionally encourage unsolicited advances, on top of all this, they have to do their work effectively and efficiently. No wonder women excel at multitasking. Oh, the only surety of survival is...you burn the whole effing place down.

Vishal Bhardwaj's strength is complex characters-driven drama, probing the human psyche and exploring how the characters deal with their inner conflicts and moral dilemmas. The characters in his movies may be gangsters, Underworld dons, or terrorists but they all seem normal, humane, and rooted in reality and with the strong flavor of local culture.

These characters, though very real, always have their eccentricities and idiosyncrasies which make them interesting and lift the movie itself and the whole experience of watching the movie. Salman-Salman (identical twins) in Haider, Shahid Kapoor (his peculiar stammering) & Bhope Bhau (with his piles) in Kaminey, Nandu Khatri (his petty greed and the whole mannerism) in The Blue Umbrella, to name a few; Maqbool, Omkara, 7 Khoon Maaf, Patakha are filled with such characters.

But when the main characters are one-dimensional, the plot falls flat and the screenplay is all over the place, the same peculiarities and quirks become irritating, painful, and stick out like a sore thumb. One such quirky character in Khufiya is the mother-in-law, although brilliantly performed (by Navnindra Behl) contributed nothing. Similarly, the spiritual guru, Yaar Jogiya (inspired by Sadguru?) played by Rahul Ram was also completely out of place and the whole sub-plot was boring and didn't work at all.

As mentioned, the screenplay is all over the place, literally and figuratively. Bangladesh in the first act, New Delhi in the second act, and finally in South Dakota, USA in the third act, but the agenda of the film and intent of the director are more scattered than the physical locations shown. Was he attempting for a cerebral geo-political/spy-thriller or going for a detailed character study set in this world, or was attempting to make a generic, quirky masala thriller? Sadly he failed in all three.

In the promotional interviews Vishal said he was fascinated and inspired by the details of the spy world described in Aamar Bhushan's book (Escape to Nowhere, on which the film is loosely based), but where is that detail in the movie, Vishal? No spy-craft or thrill in this spy-thriller. It is rather a dull spy-family drama showing the age-old, stereotypical, and much-explored personal life of spies in cinema (recently and much more effectively in the web series The Family Man).

The casting of the minor character, if rightly done adds to the believability of the world depicted in the film and supports the main cast. In Khufiya, none of the minor characters impress (which otherwise is always a strong point in Vishal's films), especially the American characters are performed so badly that they appear as caricatures (didn't work, if intentional).

Wamiqa Gabbi is fun to watch and Azmeri Haque Badhon really impressed in whatever small screetime she had. Ali Fazal, Ashish Vidhyarthi, and Atul Kulkarni all are good, and Tabu is Tabu although the character has nothing much to offer.