Paatal Lok is a nine-episode
series adapted from Tarun Tejpal’s critically acclaimed book 'The Story of My
Assassins'.Tejpal, ex-editor of Tehelka, was accused of sexual assault by a colleague
and is currently out on bail Which is presumably why his name or the name of
the book doesn’t feature in the credits An Amazon spokesperson said that Tejpal
was not involved in any manner in any phase of the development or production of
the show I haven’t read the book, but the show is terrifying and terrific. Paatal
Lok is constructed as an investigative thriller Four killers have been arrested
for trying to murder Sanjeev Mehra the head of a leading news channel and one
of the country’s most high-profile journalists The case has been assigned to a
washed-out, mediocre cop who works in the Outer Jamuna Paar police station or
what he calls Paatal Lok jismein keede rehte hain But the rather unfortunately
named Haathi Ram Chaudhary whose life has been a series of slights and failures
instinctively understands that this case can be a game-changer Because it
involves Sanjeev a man from the upper echelons of what he calls Swarg Lok. Who
lives and who dies in this strata of society actually matters Aided by his
fresh-faced junior Ansari, Haathi Ram tries to uncover the motives of the four
assassins, Of course, little goes according to plan and even less is what it
appears to be Paatal Lok is the first series by Clean Slate Filmz the
production house run by Anushka Sharma and her brother Karnesh It’s been
created by Sudip Sharma who wrote NH10 and Udta Punjab. Sudip has also
co-written the series along with Sagar Haveli, Hardik Mehta and Gunjit Chopra The the show has been directed by Avinash Arun who made the National Award-winning
Marathi film Killa and Prosit Roy who made the horror film Pari
This is a crew
brimming with talent and their collective skills create fireworks on screen Paatal
Lok is a tightly knit thriller with every episode ending on a cliffhanger which
forces you to keep bingeing The suspense doesn’t flag, but our perception of the
characters shifts as the story unravel so that it becomes impossible to decide
the good, bad and ugly Paatal Lok means underworld so it would be futile to
look for a moral center but what little goodness there is resides mostly in
women, children, and dogs It’s telling that Haathi Ram is named after an animal There
is little humanity in the humans here This world and these characters are
meticulously detailed From the sullen stare of Haathi Ram’s teenage son to this
Buddhist chanting that Sanjeev’s wife organizes to keep her husband safe to
this incredibly vulgar opulent office of a shady builder where the receptionist
is dressed in this amazing Greek toga and she addresses her guests with Talreja
Pranam The directors locate that thread of absurdity in the rampant consumerism
of contemporary India, The narrative travels from Delhi to Chitrakoot and Punjab
and the distinct accents, language, and specific courses are one of the
highlights of the show There's one particularly horrific scene in which a
character is explaining to Haathi Ramthe various types of sexual crime that can
be inflicted to settle scores There’s penetration with fingers there's rape and
there's rape with murder And the last is appropriately called Poora kaam Haathi
Ram belongs to the pantheon of memorable investigators that streaming platforms
have given us like Sartaj Singh in Sacred Games and Srikant Tiwari in The
Family Man Haathi Ram is a man who has spent his life dealing with violence and
vice and yet he retains his honesty His inherent dignity and sense of righteousness
might be fatigued but it refuses to fade Jaideep Ahlawat an actor I’ve admired
since his stellar turn in Gangs of Wasseypur
finally gets a role to match his
blazing talent Haathi Ram’s face and his eyes seem bruised by the brutality he
has encountered but he is still, every inch the everyman hero Despite the odds Haathi Ram, like a modern-day Sisyphus,
continues to push his rock uphill and probe until the pieces of the puzzle fall
into place Haathi Ram is up against formidable opponents including the murderer
Hathoda Tyagi named so because he prefers to kill with a hammer Abhishek
Banerjee’s pitiless furious gaze is guaranteed to give you sleepless nights There’s
also Neeraj Kabi pitch-perfect as Sanjeev who is by turns, arrogant afraid,
entitled In a rare moment of vulnerability Sanjeev says We used to be heroes,
people like us Then something about this country changed Now we get trolled,
killed, fired This is what elevates Paatal Lok from a skillful thriller to
something bigger and more essential Every turn of the twisted plot serves as a scathing commentary on the state of our nation But this isn’t done with a
sledgehammer It’s done with economy and skill in the little moments Watch the
small slights that Ansari must endure at the station because he’s Muslim Ansari
is smart, brave, clearly headed for a bright future and yet, within the
majority Hindu force he is a second-class citizen and he's reminded at every
turnabout his status Paatal Lok lays bare the bigotry that has seeped into the fabric of this country In a heartbreaking scene the father of one of the
accused asks jisey Maine musalmaan na banne Diya aap logon ne usey jihadi banaa
Diya
Paatal Lok showcases caste corruption, greed, dirty politics It explores
the backstories of the lead characters revealing the cauldron of poverty and
hate that creates killers This might not be new information but what’s chilling
is how casually it all plays out A key character explains that what everyone
thinks of as a rotten system is, in fact, a well-oiled machine in which every
part knows his job and anyone who doesn’t is just replaced There’s plenty of
violence in the show but for me, this was the most frightening moment The
violence gets gory and in places, gratuitous This is an overwhelmingly male the world in which heads and fingers get chopped off brains are splashed on streets
and even children have subjected to unspeakable brutality The women are mostly
collateral damage in the game for power and money being played by men Gul Panag
breaks the bleakness with her feisty presence as Haathi Ram’s wife Swastika
Mukherjee is also lovely as Sanjeev’s long-suffering spouse These actors leave
a mark in the little screen time they have The locations in this show are also
characters –especially the river, which is a site for romance violence,
contemplation and excretion In one of the early episodes, a character trying to
relieve himself near the river where the cops are trudging the river for a key
clue, says that they won’t even let him shit in peace It’s funny and sad Avinash
doubles up as DOP along with Saurabh Goswami for all 9 episodes The two shroud
this grim world in a green-grey palette which is momentarily broken by bright
lights The climactic detour into a village fair is especially dazzling As is
the haunting background music by Naren Chandavarkar and Benedict Taylor and the
editing by Sanyukta Kaza Paatal Lok is the type of storytelling that streaming
platforms were made for –dense, layered, ambitious, ambiguous I highly
recommend that you make time for it.
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