It remains a lot like Delhi Belly instead, the (Akshat Verma) writer of which makes his directorial debut here. He’s on the ball for sure. Is it as good as Delhi Belly? As a script? Possibly. As a film, I felt it lacks rhythm, with too much being force-fed to suit the timeline of one never-ending night in Bombay, even if that’s the genre. The end might make you go, “Eh?” But through it all, you’re more likely to go, “Hah!” So nah, I’m not complaining at all.

I must also make a quick confession here. Due to unavoidable time constraints, I had to watch the screener of this film, rather than catch it in a theatre. I don’t know whether that puts me at an advantage/disadvantage as a viewer.

This film, where Vidya shows up as a vivacious, fat Virar aunty, embodying all the compassions and contradictions within a modern desi woman, is not an exception, by any means. It is really as good as it gets.

This is the sort of script that world champions of the desi rom-com genre would’ve taken to an altogether level. To be fair, director Tanuja Chandra (in fine form) makes it more than a ‘qarib qarib’ lovely, and surely worth your while in the theatre.

…don’t remember the last time I watched a full-on, no-nonsense, whodunit Hindi mainstream murder mystery in a theatre, with no way to talk about it but to urge you to see it, because that’s the only way we can discuss it any further. I think you should check it out, just so we can take this conversation offline, to start with!

I’ve lost count of the number of times Aamir Khan has showed up in theatres in the final quarter, with what could be the most universally loved movie of the year. This is very likely to be another one. As you can tell, I totally loved it!

Does it hold you right till the very end, gently nudging you to think about ‘the greatest internal security threat to our country?’ Hell, yeah. That way, Newton packs a full-ton, and deserves full marks!

What’s the filmmakers’ single biggest achievement then? That they get away with a film full of double meanings, without ever seeming crass or cheap at any point. This is a miracle, only undone by quite a few moments where they stretch the limits of imagination a bit too far for comfort. Does the movie find solutions, or urge you to dig deeper on the issue? Not really, only great movies tend to do that—this one comes quite close to being that by the way.

…if you took out all the characters and crime-history from Gangs Of Wasseypur, you’ll come close to this. Given what a masterpiece Gangs was, that’s a pretty good compliment by the way!

Indu Sarkar is the name of the lead character in this film; Sarkar, being her Bengali husband’s last name. That play of words is by far the only thing clever about this blatantly political propaganda picture.