Genre: Social Thriller
Language: Hindi
Release Date: 5-Jun-2020
Platform: Theater / OTT Details: Netflix
Duration: 1 hour 54 minutes
Age Suitability: 13+
WMR Rating: 3/5
Synopsis
In Choked, the Netflix original film directed by Anurag Kashyap and co-produced by his Good Bad Films, a woman working as a cashier in a Bank discovers a secret source of unlimited cash stacks in her house and what follows is a test of the most crucial human vice – greed, against the boundaries of morality and ethics. Saiyami Kher plays Sarita, a middle-class lady who is weighed down by the debts of her jobless husband, Sushant (Roshan Mathew) and her own crushed dreams of becoming a singing sensation.
Caught in the rigmarole of a mediocre job and a daily drudgery that includes balancing her strained marriage and taking care of her eight-year-old son, her life takes a turn when she suddenly stumbles upon bundle of folded currency notes gurgled up in the spurt of sewage waste from the choked pipe in her kitchen. Interestingly, it becomes a daily night affair!
What does she do with those notes? Should she declare them to the right authority or remain mum? She chooses to do the latter, until the declaration of demonetisation wrecks the nation’s economic equilibrium and her personal motives.
Performances
Choked is embellished with some terrific and earnest performances. Saiyami Kher imbues Sarita with the unmistakable worldly weariness and her sullen eyes convey immense depth, channeling her deep sorrows and regrets. Roshan Mathew is a revelation.
The Malayalam actor is absolutely convincing as the couch-potato, slacker husband with his own set of insecurities and a failed career of a musician. Amruta Subhash relishes her role as the opportunistic neighbor with remarkable ease and conviction. Kashyap’s trademark of depicting flawed characters with honesty is observed in the surrounding cast as well.
Technical Details
Direction and Editing
Kashyap, who is known for exploring the darker side of the human psyche in all his works, astutely presents the struggles of the lower middle-class life in the throbbing maximum city and his cinematic sensibilities perpetuate into the heart of this film. Choked vividly chronicles the ugly, yet a nuanced side of their existence.
But after a point, the narrative gets tedious, and you start exasperating. This deviates from the film’s flourishing twisty-thriller vibes, and it derails into a moral quandary. In Kashyap’s universe, there is no room for optimism or easy, straight-forward answers. Choked beats his ideology with its plot contrivances and convolutions.
Screenplay and Script
Written by Nihit Bhave, the plot intricately weaves the complexities in the couple’s marriage with the extra-ordinary situation they are thrown in. The film’s title works as a double-headed metaphor. At one level, it refers to the blocked drainpipe in the dingey flat where the family lives, and the insufferable condition of its protagonist who is overworked and frustrated with life.
At the other level, it is the recurring reminiscence of a fiasco that occurred to her in a singing competition eventually shattering her beloved ambition. The film’s narrative is instilled with some winning moments, but the writing could have been sharper to keep you thoroughly engaged.
Cinematography and Production Design
DOP Sylvester Fonseca unflatteringly lenses the commutes in the local train, the rundown apartments, the nosy and cantankerous neighbors with little concern for your privacy and the horrors of demonetization.
Characterized by modest production values (Production Design by Ravi Srivastava, Set Design by Seema Kashyap, Art Direction by Vilas Kolap), Choked has a lived-in and authentic feel with real people.
Music and background score
The movie's spirit is uplifted by a moody music by Karsh Kale
Overall Review:
Choked, with all its virtues, is the least cynical film of Kashyap that I have seen. Juxtaposed against a real-life event that disrupted the socio-political landscape of the entire nation almost four years back, the film is satisfying but not a compelling watch.
WMR Rating: 3.0/5.0
Performances: 4.0/5.0
Direction and Editing: 3.5/5.0
Screenplay and Script: 3.0/5.0
Cinematography and Production Design: 3.5/5.0
Music and Background score: 3.0/5.0
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