Samrat & Co.

Cast: Rajeev Khandelwal (Samrat Tilakdhari), Madalsa Sharma (Dimpy Singh), Gopal Datt (Chakradhar Pandey), Girish Karnad (Mahendra Pratap Singh), Priyanshu Chatterjee (Sanjay Singh), Sujata Sanghmitra (Sunita Singh), Shreya Narayan (Divya Singh), Indraneil Sengupta (Vijay Singh), Barkha Bisht (Revati Singh), Ravi Jhankal (Puran Kaka), Puja Gupta (Shanti), Navin Prabhakar (Hari), Rajneesh Duggal (Deepak), Bhaumik Sampat (Inspector Khalid), Pradeep Welankar (DGP Arjun), Smita Jaykar (Narayani Dave), Deepak Shroff (Kishore Dave), Ramgopal Bajaj (Satyadev Baba), Anurag Jha (Ghanshyam), Ajay Bhandari (Anuj), Gufi Paintal (Dinesh Das), Kabir Chopra (Vikramjeet)

Genre: Investigative Thriller, Suspense

Direction: Kaushik Ghatak

Production: Kavita K Barjatya, Rajshri Productions

Written by: Kaushik Ghatak, Manish Shrivastava

Cinematographer: Sanjay Malwankar

Editor: Nipun Gupta

Studio: Rajshri Productions

Distribution: Rajshri Productions

Music: Ankit Tiwari, Mithoon

Release Date: 25^th April, 2014

Language: Hindi

Duration: 2 hours 05 minutes

The Plot:

Samrat & Co., an Investigative Thriller movie, is an effort of the director Kaushik Ghatak to give India its Sherlock Holmes (and of course Watson as well). But somewhere the effort fizzles out.

Story of a case handled by Samrat Tilakdhari (Rajeev Khandelwal, erstwhile television heart-throb – Sach ka Samna, Kahin to Hoga fame), a detective who is extraordinarily observant man. He handles only those cases which give him a feeling of thrill and adventure. He wears trench-coat, derives inferences about people he has just met. But he utters his words so fast that as an audience, I could not comprehend half of them. His ‘Watson’ Chakradhar aka CD (Gopal Datt), calls Samrat STD (Sharp Teekhi Drishti) and hosts a programme called Chakradhar ka Chakraview.

Dimpy Singh (Madalsa Sharma) arrives at the doorstep of Samrat. Before Dimpy could even speak out the reason behind her visit, Samrat spells out breathlessly about Dimpy and her background and in the process impresses her. Dimpy had a strange case for Samrat i.e. both her garden and her father Mahendra Pratap Singh (Girish Karnad) are suffering after the death of a gardener, followed by the premature death of a horse. Flowers don’t bloom in her garden, and Mahendra Pratap Singh’s mental health is deteriorating. He is paranoid about lot many things. Dimpy wants Samrat to unfold the mystery behind these things.

Samrat decides to take up the case, and goes along with Dimpy to her palatial mansion in Shimla. There he meets Dimpy’s brothers, elder one Sanjay Singh (Priyanshu Chatterjee), and the younger one Vijay Singh (Indraneil Sengupta). Sanjay welcomes Samrat whereas Vijay did not approve of Samrat initially. A mysterious fire catches a tree (the fire looked absolutely animated and artificial). Mahendra Pratap Singh recognizes Samrat as detective and warns him so as to stay just as Dimpy’s friend and not as a detective in the house.

Thereafter, lots of characters are introduced: Divya Singh (Shreya Narayan) – undergoing psychiatric treatment, Narayani Dave (Smita Jaykar as wife of Mahendra Pratap Singh), Revati Singh (Barkha Bisht), manager Deepak (Rajneesh Duggal), Puran Kaka (Ravi Jhankal), Maid Shanti, a Kleptomaniac (Puja Gupta), Hari (Navin Prabhakar), Satyadev Baba (Ramgopal Bajaj), Bhaumik Sampat (Inspector Khalid), Pradeep Welankar (DGP Arjun) etc.

Mahendra Pratap is found murdered in his room and the main suspect is Vijay, the younger son, who is accused of smothering his dad to death. Samrat tries to get to the depth of this murder, but then what ensues is series of mysterious deaths. Many characters mentioned above turn out to be the suspects as well.

Did Vijay actually kill his father ? Why there were more suspects? Was it a group attempt ? What were the logics which made the suspects the ‘suspects’ in Samrat’s eyes ? How did Samrat reach the actual murderer ? What were the motives of the murderer (s) ? Watch the movie to seek the answers.

Cast and their Performance:

Rajeev Khandelwal is a very intense actor and he has given great performances in the past. But he has not given a power-packed performance in this movie. His dialogue delivery is at such fast pace (probably to justify his STD image), but does not go very well.

Nothing much to mention about other cast. Girish Karnad, another great actor, is completely wasted in this movie.

One-Liner:

‘Samrat & Co.’ does not unfold any ‘Dilchasp Rahasya’ (interesting mystery)…

Rating: 2 / 5 (Average)