Durgamati Review: A Complete Snoozefest!

Part of Amazon Prime Video’s exclusive releases this year is G. Ashok’s Durgamati: The Myth starring Bhumi Pednekar in the lead role with Arshad Warsi, Mahie Gill, Jisshu Sengupta, and Karan Kapadia in the supporting roles. The story begins with idols being stolen from ancient Hindu Temples and the distress it is causing the locals. Their messiah is Ishwar Prasad (Arshad Warsi), a loyal public servant with a spotless political record, who is ready to give up his political career if the demands of his people are not met. Durgamati Review

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A CBI case is created to implicate Prasad as the mastermind behind these antique stolen idols. The inquiry brings into the picture Mahie Gill as Satakshi Ganguly and Jisshu Sengupta as ACP Abhay Singh, who is leading the charge in this inquiry. The key to this inquiry, according to Ganguly (Mahie Gill), is IAS Chanchal Chauhan ( Bhumi Pednekar), who has been Prasad’s close aide. Durgamati Review

However, Chauhan is currently serving her time in prison for the murder of Shakti Singh (Karan Kapadia), who was her fiance and Abhay’s younger brother. For the inquiry to be hush, Chanchal is shifter to a haunted castle, and there is where the tale of Durgamati: The Myth begins. Durgamati Review

This 155-minute movie is predictable, and its plot, completely jaded. Durgamati: The Myth is a remake of the Telugu-Tamil bilingual film Bhaagamathie, released in 2018. And we feel that there was absolutely nothing in this film that warrants the need to remake it. The best that could have been done was to dub the original in Hindi and leave it be. The screenplay of the movie is rushed and quite often jumps from scene to scene without seamless transition.

Furthermore, dialogues written in this movie appear to have been translated literally from the original because many times the dialogues are textbook style. It is tiring to watch the fixed template of a ghost having inverted feet, candles blowing off on their own, creaking doors and windows, and badly created digital shadows in smoke that need to be done away with and fast.

Also, the soundtrack of the movie by Tanishk Bagchi, Naman Adhikari, Abhinav Sharma, and Malini Awasti does little to nothing for this movie. However, the art direction of the film fits the bill for the story but then in a sea of negatives it isn’t a significant positive.

Bhumi Pednekar’s portrayal of Chanchal, of a well-groomed prisoner / IAS Officer, is bland and stiff. It seems that the only effort put in by the makers in Chanchal’s character was the provision of a fitted jail uniform. For the titular character, the director has picked up the portrayal of Manjulika from Bhool Bhulaiyaa and asked Bhumi to copy it. But the power Vidya Balan had displayed through and through was completely missing here. The scene where Bhumi Pednekar’s character reveals herself as the ghost queen is amateurish has zero impact, and the high tempo background score also fails to create the power required.

Mahie Gill as the stoic CBI Officer also fails to impress. There is a very forced attempt in dialogue delivery to justify her character being a Bengali. However, there are some scenes where her talent comes through towards the end. Arshad Warsi as Ishwar Prasad starts with a labored attempt at portraying his character to be sincere.

Even in the latter half, there is very little redemption for him. It is only his last confrontational scene with Bhumi Pednekar, where we see the actor we know from his previous work. Newcomer Karan Kapadia looks to be putting in a lot of effort to reach the emotional requirement of the character. Jisshu Sengupta as ACP Abhay Singh brings some semblance of an acting performance to the movie, but that is more due to his talent and less of the writing or direction of the film.

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Overall, if you are looking for a horror-thriller film, then Durgamati: The Myth is not your pick. If you are too lazy to turn to the Hindi dubbed version of the Original, then you can watch this film. Watch ‘Durgamati: The Myth’ on Amazon Prime Video here.

Rating – 1/5 | Grade – D

Images via Prime Video
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