Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar Review: A mystery so deprived of creativity and originality

Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar Review: A mystery so deprived of creativity and originality

What: ‘Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar’ - unabashedly traces it's 'Hitchcockian' roots to its 1989 namesake original, Keshu Ramsay thriller ‘Khoj’ that starred Rishi Kapoor and an eclectic ensemble comprising Naseeruddin Shah, Danny Dengzongpa and Kimi Katkar.

Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar web series review

In fact, ‘Khoj’ was inspired from the 1981 Dulaal Guha's mystery thriller, ‘Dhuaan’. A little research would reveal that all of these pulpy Bollywood thrillers were derived from a Brit film, ‘Chase a Crooked Shadow’ that plucked it's plot from an Agatha Christie bestseller. Actually, the inspirations are numerous.

But ‘Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar’ is so deprived of originality that even its title and punchline are directly lifted from Bollywood and Brit! The only novelty here is that is set in a tech savvy age, and we hear terminologies like Deep-fake!

A lawyer, Ved Khanna (Sharib Hashmi) drowned in panicky, reports a missing case of his wife, Mira at a police station in Panchgani. To his rude shock, a woman (played by Anupriya Goenka) lands up at his mansion and proclaims to be her wife. Furthermore, his sister-in-law and daughter identify her as Mira! Inspector Amol Sathe (Aamir Dalvi), a wannabe crime thriller novelist, with kindergarten level wisdom takes up the case, only to be convinced that she is not an imposter, but his wife in real.

Saddled with inept writing, Hashmi tries hard to transcend his superficial character but in vain. There is no variation in the emotions that Ved navigates as a troubled father and a grieving widower rather the variation is only noted in the shades of the same outfit that he dons.

Ditto for Goenka's Mira - her glossy hair and manicured nails resonate with the artificiality of her ill-baked character. And so do the sets. A police station has never looked this neat earlier. A lawyer has never been this incompetent. The chaos has never been this sanitized. To give credits where due, I found Dalvi's performance fascinating and his Marathi diction flawless. Unfortunately, his Kennedy (Anurag Kashyap) has still not seen light of the day.

‘Khoj: Parchaiyon Ke USS Paar’ is so cringy that it would even put the DD crime thrillers of yore to shame. The 1989 film has a vintage value and credible performances, which Prabal Baruah's series seriously lacks. This is a shame to have squandered the potential of such a gripping and captivating material.

It is too synthetic to generate suspense. Too plastic to generate pressure, or poignancy.

And too banal to be even called as a bargain basement version.

I go with 2 stars out of 5 for Khoj. Produced by Juggernaut pictures, the 7-episode series is streaming on Zee5 from 27th December 2024.

 

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