Shri Swapankumarer Badami Hyenar Kobole

This film is a mess. Neither it engages you, not it gives you a thrilling storyline. Apart from Abir, the rest of the cast is completely miscast. Abir also has done a very poor job comparing to his work in Rawktobeej. The acting of the lady cop/detective is very forced, her looks are horrible. If you are making a movie where it is mandatory to read the reference books, then you have failed as a filmmaker. The presence of Mr Swapankumar is so irritating that you would want to skip his portion instantly. I was waiting for this film to arrive in Hoichoi, but I was so deeply disappointed. This type of films make me lose my faith in Kolkata films.

The façade of decency and sophistication in bengalees is not unknown, it seems that pseudo-intellectualism is the only thing we now have as a community, we are clinging to the fossils of greatness, resorting to milking them until they dry, and it is drying. Debaloy Bhattacharya's 'Shri Swapankumarer Badami Hyenar Kobole (2024)' may not be an anger-filled ultimatum to the fossilized culture we have, but the intention is clear from the very beginning. The film surely takes a jibe at the decaying heritage of a community that pioneered art, culture, and music back then.

Debaloy Bhattacharya interestingly resorts to channel his take through reestablishing a pulp genre detective who used to roam around readers' hearts and hands way before 'Byomkesh' and 'Feluda' came. But this time, the detective is placed in modern-day Kolkata, where the existence of pulp fiction is a distant memory, where there is no room for something fresh and organic in any forms of art be it cinema or literature.

Deepak Chatterjee(Abir) is a once glorious pulp detective who is now guarding an already rotten library as a night guard, he is weary, he is tired, and he is having conversations with his creator Swapan Kumar(Paran Bandhopadhyay ), cursing him for lack of realism in his characters, logic in his stories and also refusing to be part of any other new stories starring him.

The conversations between them act as a meta-commentary of the drought in the creativity of Bengali films, the façade of sophistication of Bengali audiences. As an actor, Abir has essayed two most beloved sleuths in Bengali literature, and now he has sidelined himself from playing them, so the character of a world-weary detective works both ways, both on the surface and meta-level. It seems like fatigue has come over by playing the same characters over and over again with no room for innovation in them.

Debaloy Bhattacharya is an avid pulp fiction worshipper, where any director could have bastardized the nature of the source material by being edgy, he never lets that lash go out of his hand. Although the film is self-conscious of its pulpy nature, over-the-top dialogues, and cartoonish villains, it never shies away from the essence of pulp that Swapankumar used to serve its readers. But there is a certain limit to those fictions in an ever-changing world, a certain expiry date of cheap thrills found in those fictions.

In the film, the writer and his character tussle in debates about whether changing your art through time is viable or remaining orthodox and rigid in your approach works or not.

The creator and creation are involved in creative differences throughout the film, can a character survive without his creator is surely a metaphor for the importance of writers in a film. The Writers Guild strike and the threat of AI takeover signify that Debaloy is not only criticizing Bengali films but as a whole the phenomenon of demeaning writers everywhere.

As absurdities crawl in the narrative, we can't help but smile but immediately the self-conscious nature of the narrative makes us question how long these convenient tropes prevalent in Bengali cinema will work. It is a spectacular achievement in balancing out those two which Debaloy does with flying colors, maybe sometimes he is too self-indulgent but that's forgivable.

Abir is so well suited for this role, and so is our veteran Paran Bandopadhyay whose chemistry is the USP of this film, maybe this is the most unique character played by Abir in his career.

The supporting cast although good adds nothing extra to the narrative.

If you take out the social commentaries, there is nothing such as a convincing storyline anywhere, maybe because of its pulpy nature, but still it could have created memorable side characters especially when there is a clear indication of a sequel.

Also, the spectacular editing gives us a nostalgic trip to the book jackets back then, with the stunts visually synchronous to browsing comic strips. The spectacular monochromatic lighting, and gorgeous visuals all speak for the technical fluency in the film.

Debaloy Bhattacharya has always tried to experiment with his films, sometimes they are successful, sometimes they are not but still he experiments. This film belongs to the former category, it's a long-awaited subversion of telling a Bengali detective story.

This movie is so bad that swapna Kumar the writer may come and haunt the director. I was pretty much exited for this one because of the story also a bit for abir. For long I was thinking why no one is making any movie on Shri swapan Kumar's stories.

Now if I come to the movies it's pretty much pathetic. I was trying so hard to complete it but was unable to do so. Some random stuff was happing, extremely dramatic which was not needed, pretty much boring and so on.

From the outset, the film struggles to find its footing, careening wildly between subplots without ever fully committing to any one narrative thread. Characters are introduced and promptly forgotten, their backstories hastily sketched out in clumsy exposition dumps that do little to endear them to the audience. The result is a disjointed jumble of half-baked ideas that never coalesce into a cohesive whole.

I was waiting for this movie for a long time. But Watching it was a dejecting feeling. The presence of the writer Swapankumar, enacted by Paran Banerjee, has made it more monotonous. Banerjee's monologue is too dull. The occasional reference and deliberate comparison of Dipak Chatterjee with the immortal character, particularly Feluda, is utterly unacceptable. The theme and content do not have a head or tail. No doubt, the detective stories of Swapankumar are entertaining. But the perspective of this generation is different. The film has done more injustice to Swapankumar. The initiation of Swapankumar detective stories is a super flop. It is utterly worthless content.

My Review of #ShriSwapankumarerBadamiHyenarKobole ::: Direction by #DebaloyBhattacharya is fairly good. His storytelling narrative is not intriguing, but his shot-taking style is very fresh. Dialogues are superbly penned. Many scenes and shots resemble his previous films, specially #DraculaSir.

Cinematography by #RamyadeepSaha is of first order. Marvellous would be an understatement. Editing by #SanglapBhowmick is very slow paced, just like the screenplay. So, the audience tends to get bored very soon. Music by #AmitChatterjee is fresh to the ear, but not hummable enough. But the song 'Mushroom' is well-composed. Production company #HoichoiStudios ( #Hoichoi ) & distribution by #ShreeVenkateshFilms ( #SVF ) has made this venture saleable, but its Box Office glorious run is debatable.

As per as the performances are concerned, #AbirChatterjee as Dipak Chatterjee & #ParanBandopadhyay as Sri Swapankumar has tried their best to backup the poor screenplay with their screen presence by acting well.

#ShrutiDas as Tashi is not at all impressive and looked very dull and stiff in her dialogues delivery. #GoutamHalder as usual acted as a carbon copy in his signature style. #PratikDutta as Ratanlal is a new and fresh discovery and someone to watch out for. #LoknathDey is good. Last but definitely not the least, theatre & TV actress #SaoliBandopadhyay looked very confident and tried her best as much she can, in her few scenes. But her atrocious wig looked very poor on her. But overall, if you leave your brain, aptitude and logic at your home, and come to enjoy a #PulpFiction film based on a graphic novel chain of the similar genre, then you would surely gonna enjoy the film. One-Time watch or a Timepass 👍🏻