Watched a Bengali movie after a long, long time, and I chose a Whodunit Genre. To get out of Reader’s Block, many choose to read a book of their favorite Genre, a Short Story, or a Novella. Similarly, for me to start re-watching Bengali movies, I chose the mystery genre. Heck, why not? They keep us guessing and keep us on the edge of our seats. Gladly, the movie wasn’t boring, but it has its share of problems. Don’t worry, go ahead and read it. I won’t spoil the film for you. 😃

Cast: Rituparna Sengupta, Rahul Bose, Kaushik Sen, Ananya Chatterjee, Subrat Dutta, Raunak Dey Bhowmick, and many others

Crew: Sayantan Ghosal (Director), Sougata Basu (Writer), Anupam Roy (Music Composer), Tuban (Cinematographer), Subhajit Sinha (Editor)

Anurekha Sengupta, aka Madam Sengupta (Rituparna Sengupta), is a famed Cartoonist, and she arrives in Kolkata following the mysterious death of her daughter. A couple more murders occur mysteriously, and all fingers point to her Ex-Husband and playwright, Satyaki Sengupta (Kaushik Sen); however, she doesn’t believe it and joins forces with her friend Ranjan (Rahul Bose), who also happens to be a well-known publisher. Ranjan receives a doll after each murder from the famous AbolTabol collection, written by the renowned Children’s Author, Sukumar Ray. Together, Ranjan and Madam Sengupta try to uncover the brains behind these murders and the reason for using AbolTabol character dolls.

Eventhough they call this film a Neo-Noir, somehow it felt like a gimmick rather than a tool to tell the story. The first half of the film was haphazardly written to fit into the Neo-noir genre for the sake of it, because it was boring, and the story wasn’t leading anywhere except for more Murders and murder attempts. However, that is the only complaint I have about this film.

Eventhough, I haven’t heard about AbolTabol or read the poems or rhymes, the way the Writer interpreted the characters and how the Director showcased that visually was impressive. It reminded me of a scene from Hemanth Rao’s Kavaludaari (Kannada) movie, where the Lead tries to identify the Perpetrator. In this movie, the leads try to identify the meaning behind the dolls from the AbolTabol book and the victims.

Throughout the film, I suspected someone was the main culprit; however, the twist at the end changed everything. Eventhough the film has so many Characters from the Arts background and talks about various forms of art, the reason for the murders seemed to be different. Maybe I was expecting too much throughout the film, but I felt dejected. However, you might not feel the same way; you might have a different interpretation of the ending. Overall, Madam Sengupta is a decent watch, and if you’re a fan of the Whodunit genre, you might definitely like this film.

I wasn’t sure why they titled this film “Madam Sengupta.”? If you have already watched the film, do tell me, I’m curious. If you haven’t, watch the movie and tell me your thoughts on the title.

Until next time, Ciao 😇