Directed by: Kunal Kohli
Cast: Richa Chadha, Karishma Tanna, Khalid Siddiqui, Arunodaya Singh
BLUF
This is the story of spies who in the process of conducting espionage have to distinguish between their personal lives and the mission that may override their own personalities.
THE MEAT AND POTATOES
Lahore Confidential is set in the Indian High Commission Lahore, Pakistan where Ananya (Richa Chadha) is a media attaché who works with the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the Indian intelligence agency, in Delhi.
She is recruited by two Indian agents Rajiv (Khalid Siddiqui) and Yukti (Karishma Tanna), to be the soft informer to their missions by mingling with a good looking local events organizer Rauf Ahmed (Arunodaya Singh ) of mushairas (Sessions where Urdu language poetry is recited)
IN THE ZONE
Written by Vibha Singh, the movie is directed by Kunal Kohli and produced by Ajay Rai of Jar Pictures. The cinematography by Karthik Ganesh is remarkable. Music, despite the Urdu effect, is passable
Richa Chadha looks as if she has been forced to act her part. Apart from uninspiring, her entire performance lacks emotional appeal. Knowing that she can turn up seriously great performances, it is sad to see her lacking the spirit to make her character Ananya realistic or plausible. Her reactions in some serious scenes are quite comical because they lack the characterizations required for that scene.
Arunoday Singh tries hard at Urdu but fails at diction and the Pakistani Urdu accent. Karishma Tanna is dialogues of a man-eater and looks desperate enough to deserve them.
Khalid Siddiqui keeps screaming into phones and screens but the plot is so unconvincing that the best of the actors look rudderless.
FWAR
The Indian content writers have not excelled at the thriller genre a lot.
The film has a brain-dead storyline, boring performances and mind-disorienting dialogues. It is a very dreary watch and largely monotonous. Considering that S Hussain Zaidi is credited with the story idea of Lahore Confidential, it is shockingly sub-par.
The plot is perforated with ambiguities, and very dumb cause and effect situations.
Most of my time while watching Lahore Confidential, I was fighting the impulse to scream at Richa Chadha’s portrayal of a brain-dead Ananya, who contrary to a spy agency training walks into situations that even Lucile Ball would know not to steer into.
The plot is so weak and assailable that you feel that maybe it was not the best weed that they consumed before penning this movie on the back of a napkin.
The interactions between Ananya and her mother (Alka Amin) are so irritating and unnecessary that you wonder if she is just there to increase your angst. That must be the real plot reveal.
Then there is that stoopy scene when three apparently highly competent Indian agents are killed because of Ananya’s blatant absurdity, and all she can say is, “Sorry, sorry, I’m really sorry”,….
We felt like hitting the TV screen. Which serious spy agency in the world puts an agent in the field when they run all the risks with her unstable state of mind and then when she lies and cheats, puts her back in the field. It seems like a script written by a 10-year-old little girl who wants to play spy barbie.
In its one hour and eight minutes, all it does is produce cringe-worthy moments.
WHAT WE LOVED
Nothing
WHAT WE MISSED
The sanity of the story
Really bad dialogues, writing, and music.
