Abhishek Chaubey’s wacky series, set in the fictional town of Mainjur in Tamil Nadu, is a delightful feast, but it falls short in providing a substantial arc for Konkona’s character
Konkona Sen Sharma has received wide acclaim as a filmmaker after Lust Stories 2, but there’s nothing more delectable than watching her perform. In Abhishek Chaubey’s crime series, Killer Soup, currently streaming on Netflix, she plays Swathi Shetty, sharing the screen with the brilliant Manoj Bajpayee, who deftly embodies the roles of Prabhakar and Umesh — whose backgrounds, traits and mannerisms are poles apart. There is an absolute synergy between these two acting powerhouses in this wacky and pulpy series. Think Lady Macbeth on steroids, Vishal Bhardwaj being more tawdry and garish, or Tabu with her aphrodisiac cooking, but replace the crab meat with a poorly made paya soup — it’s Shakespeare with an Indian kitschy touch.
Chaubey’s film, written with Unaiza Merchant, Anant Tripathi, and Harshad Nalawade, delves into the lives of individuals of the fictional town of Mainjur in Tamil Nadu who, quite literally, find themselves in a proverbial soup, as the title suggests. Swathi and her husband Prabhakar, also known as Prabhu Shetty, find themselves entrenched in what appears to be a mire of life. Swathi dreams of owning her restaurant, while Prabhu grapples with extricating himself from a multi-crore financial scandal. Offering no assistance is Prabhu’s older brother, Arvind Shetty (Sayaji Shinde), who tightly controls the family finances. Arvind’s art-loving daughter, Apeksha, fondly known as Appu (Anula Navlekar), faces resistance in pursuing her true passions, which is going to France to study art.
An oddly sublime portrayal
Adding to the concoction of faux pas and frauds, the unexpected appearance of Prabhu’s doppelgänger, the squint-eyed masseuse Umesh Pillai nee Mahto, whom Swathi is having a clandestine affair with, arrives at an inopportune moment. Blood starts spilling and bodies start piling into this soup, beckoning the keen-eyed senior Inspector Hassan (Nasser) to arrive at the scene, accompanied by Asha (Shilpa Mudbi) and the newcomer ASI Thupalli (Anbu Thasan), injecting further turmoil into the unfolding events.
As the story progresses, Sharma and Bajpayee inject vitality into their quirky characters through nuanced expressions and magnetic exchanges. Bajpayee’s craft shines through in his dual portrayal, seamlessly oscillating between self-deprecation as Umesh and exuding a god-like demeanour as Prabhu. As is expected, Swathi replaces her husband Prabhu, with Umesh — it’s dark and twisty, but also predictable. The catch comes when Bajpayee plays Umesh pretending to be Prabhu — it’s wicked, deliciously so in fact because there’s something intangible in the way that Bajpayee plays with the emotions of guilt, failure, and dignity, almost reminiscent of Macbeth. It’s easy to make out that Umesh isn’t Prabhu, and Chaubey does so intentionally in order to further accentuate Umesh’s meekness — foolishness is a flag he wears earnestly.
Sen Sharma, in her role as Swathi, transcends the ordinary and ventures into the extraordinary. Her performance is sublime; she lends a mystical glaze to her role that turns her almost psychotic darkness into a thing of profound beauty. She navigates the complexities of her character with impeccable effortlessness is marvelous. She delivers more by doing less; it is almost poetic so much so that every frame that she isn’t in, feels like a moment of celluloid wasted.
A feast to remember
Chaubey transforms the criminal landscape into a comedic canvas in a way that is bound to make the eight-episode-long show look like a feast. He laces it several cultural flavours. For instance, the show starts with the background score of Barcarolle by Jacques Offenbach, adding a wild texture to the already loopy tale situated in Tamil Nadu, where Offenbach has no place, but Chaubey is relentless in his pursuit of being the mad hatter. The hotel Prabhu wants to build is called ‘Hotel California’ while his company is called the Last Resort. Swathi is addressed as Manisha Koirala and Tu Hi Re (her ringtone) plays out as a symbol of her and Umesh’s love story. However, my favourite reference is Robert Frost’s poem Miles To Go Before I Sleep that is at the centre of a riddle in Chaubey’s universe.
The film ingeniously weaves in a flavourful motif, anchoring its narrative in the seemingly mundane yet symbolically rich staleness of the paya soup — an element Swathi envisions as the crowning glory for her dream restaurant. Chaubey’s ability to blend crime and comedy not only showcases his directorial finesse but also elevates the film to an eccentric and memorable cinematic experience. His characters feel like mock-ups who seem to be imitating how popular culture would portray them in a film if it was ever made (talk about life imitating art, and art imitating life). The frames are filled with so much colour, it’s almost like a facade to conceal the darkness festering within the tale.
However, while the dark comedy charm of the film is undeniably impressive, it’s disheartening to note that both the filmmaker and the writing team fall short in providing Konkona’s character with a substantial and subversive arc, despite their attempts. Swathi, reminiscent of Tabu’s character in Sriram Raghavan Andhadhun, is portrayed as a homemaker with grand aspirations. The men in her life may bristle at her interference, yet they shy away from expressing their dislike for her soup — a quirk that sets up expectations only to be met with disappointment.
A comic and tragic tour de force
Swathi’s character remains in a limbo, caught between potential villainy and tragedy, embodying elements of both but never fully owning either. Here, Chaubey falters where Raghavan succeeded with Tabu in Andhadhun. In contrast to Tabu’s character, who oozes a Victorian witch-like allure, Swathi is denied her rightful acknowledgment. Instead, Chaubey inexplicably transforms her into a villain, not the seductively disruptive kind, or the misunderstood one with a purpose. Instead, Swathi is portrayed as a villain simply because society will always cast a homemaker who wants more as the villain. In this missed opportunity, the film neglects to grant Swathi the complex character development she deserves.
Killer Soup might have benefited from a shorter runtime, as by the eighth hour, the initial excitement of navigating the perplexing storyline can give way to a sense of exhaustion. The initial emotion of ‘what the hell is happening’ that earlier felt intriguing now becomes a tad wearisome. The eagerness to unravel the mystery gradually transforms into fatigue, leaving the audience yearning for clarity and a more concise narrative that gets to the heart of what is truly transpiring.
All that said, not many works of cinema can boast of the brilliant performances that Killer Soup pulls off; not just Bajpayee and Sen Sharma, but also the rest of the characters. Together, they plate what can most definitely be called a comic and tragic tour de force. While it’s with faults, Killer Soup is indeed a notable feather in Hindi cinema’s pulp fiction hat.
