Afwaah Movie Review: Sudhir Mishra’s timely thought-provoking one sided political thriller drama gets defeated by its own characters

Afwaah Movie Review

Sudhir Mishra is a prolific filmmaker and with Afwaah, he tries to touch many things – racism, use of religion in politics, caste divide and of course the evil of negativity on social media and how rumours are spread to generate a bias opinion or influence certain action.

Sudhir Mishra’s till interval gives a relevant taut political thriller that probes, provokes and I wonder why not much talking about this important film happened. Though the character of Niva and one note acting of Bhumi Pednekar was off putting right from the word go.

But alas, in the second half when things are going in the right direction and heading for a striking climax, (though I was still waiting for the opinion from the other side, the afwaah of the rival parties).

The writes of Afwaah that includes Sudhir Mishra along with Apurva Dhar Badgaiyann (dialogue), Shiva Shankar Bajpai, Nisarg Mehta (screenplay) on his own story indulge in two shocking twists.

The character of Rahab Ahmed (Rahab Ahmed (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) confesses that he is also spreading false lies about his incident with racist in the west and in fact he himself is a ‘bhagoda’ who has ran away from US facing racist ire.

After that, to me after Rahab’s admission to Niva make him into a selfish coward – a hero who cannot fight and runs for shelter.

Though Nawazuddin Siddiqui tries hard to be the hep tech guy with all the trendy wheels, phones etc repeating the F*** word at will, he still remains the desi Nawazuddin Siddiqui.

Arguably, for the first time I have seen Nawazuddin Siddiqui miserably failing to get in the skin of the character and delivering the good.

On the top of that his characterisation kills the purity, Sudhir Mishra in his overenthusiasm to deliver the message on top of his lungs shoots the messenger at point black.

If Sudhir’s idea was to give us ‘gyan’ on good lie and bad lie or say good rumour or bad rumour than sorry he has missed the bus by miles.

As said earlier, it is unable to accept why Niva has agreed to get married to Vicky Bana in the first place, when she can revolt against hate politics and run away.

And one more shocker is the character of the mother of a police constable. TJ Bhanu plays the police constable and her mother persistently asks her to maintain a physical relationship with her senior for fulfilling their household needs.

Though the character of TJ Bhanu’s mother doesn,t effect the subject, but it’s an unnecessary rotten egg.

In fact, the character of TJ Bhanu should have been kept free from such pressure, it’s basically a strong character.

Ironically, the character of Vicky Bana the antagonist turns believable and his characterisation is right from the word go.  

The mob lynching, politics of hate, the evil exposure of social media, the lack of research by users before reacting all is there but the messengers – Nawaj and Bhumi are weak and dubious.

Sumeet Vyas is the one who stands out. Bhumi Pednekar is getting irritatingly repetitive nowadays. She has to find some nuances in her acting and improve herself immediately. Sharib Hashmi repeats himself.

Final words

Afwaah by Sudhir Mishtra could have been a solid thought-provoking punch on the politics of hate but it’s completely one sided, designed to please the pseudointellectuals. But, the bigger problem with this relevantly timed political drama is the flawed characterisation of the messengers - Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Bhumi Pednekar. Sudhir in his over indulgence has shot the messenger midway in delivering the message.