Durgamati Movie Review: Bhumi Pednekar couldn't match the screen presence of Anushka Shetty

Cast: Bhumi Pednekar, Arshad Warsi, Jisshu Sengupta, Mahie Gill

Directed By: G. Ashok

After Laxmii, Bollywood again uses the troupe of remaking a hit south Indian film and we get an unimaginative film called Durgamati which tries too hard. 

The plot is the same as the original, corrupt politicians trying to frame an honest counterpart by concocting the most asinine scheme. They decide that the only way to eliminate Ishwar Prasad (Arshad Warsi) is by getting a false confession out of his former associate, an IAS officer named Chanchal Chauhan (Bhumi Pednekar). But what they hadn’t anticipated was that Chanchal, while being kept in isolation at a haunted ‘haveli’ (lol, what), would get possessed by the spirit of a vengeful woman.

The problem of Durgamati is a problem every remake, its rises to replicate everything but it's lost in translation such as the comedy gags which doesn't work when you copy-paste in another language. This film also has a lot of loopholes and at the end of the movie, you will scratch your head to understand the logic behind certain scenes.

The film contains a lot of plot twist. Every time the twist revealed another twist pops out and it becomes a never-ending game. The film is filled with revelation moments, where characters abruptly pause the plot to cackle about their ulterior motives. Ashok thinks we’re all five years old.

When you think Jisshu Sengupta has done the worst movie this year with Sadak 2 you get Durgamati. He’s a war hero, and we thank him for his service. Ironically for a film that already has a talented Bengali actor in its cast, they decided that Mahie Gill should play the CBI officer Satakshi Ganguly, whose idea of playing a Bong is limited to messing up genders. The writers try to forcefully induce Bengali words so that it justifies Gill's character surname Ganguly.

Karan Kapadia, meanwhile, plays a dude who apparently watched Swades once and thought to himself, “I could do this. With tattoos.” He alternates between being a cutie-pie, a trait that Ashok chooses to highlight with random shots of the actor stroking a bunny and striking dashing poses in a field, and an Angry Young Man. To communicate this point, Ashok simply has Kapadia yell all his line.

Arshad Warsi justifies his role gives nuance to his character but it lost his charm in this mess..

Finally, Bhumi Pednekar tries too hard to surpass the charisma of Anushka Shetty but she fails miserably. Probably this is her career's worst performance.

Durgamati is a big misfire, the film is loud and tacky its neither a horror film nor a socio-political drama. This should be skipped.