Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Sharad Kelkar, Nandish Sandhu, Anurag Sinha, Zoya Afroz, Amruta Khanvilkar, Jameel Khan, Virendra Saxena, Freddy Daru...
Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Sharad Kelkar, Nandish Sandhu, Anurag Sinha, Zoya Afroz, Amruta Khanvilkar, Jameel Khan, Virendra Saxena, Freddy Daruwala, Sumit Nijhawan, Anuja Sathe, Ekavalli Khanna
Directed
by: Neeraj Pandey, Raghav M Jairath and B A Fida
Neeraj Pandey's latest Netflix series is an expose on the smuggling
activities taking place at our airports and the vital role Customs department
plays in nabbing the criminals. A relatively unexplored concept till now!!
Emraan Hashmi plays the upright Custom dude Arjun Meena, nabbing the
rookies of an International smuggling kingpin Bada Chaudhary (Sharad Kelkar,
effective as ever). His team comprises an equally honest officer Gujjar
(Nandish Sandhu) and an undercover femme fetale (Zoya Afroz), who infiltrates
Chaudhary's top brass.
Being a Neeraj Pandey production, you can safely expect adequate twists
and turns throughout the seven episodes of approximately forty- five minutes
each. The locales of Milan, Al Dera and Bangkok are competently shot. Some of
the modus operandi used by the popats (carriers) are quite an eye opener!!
On the flipside, certain twist-points aren't elaborated properly. The
background score could have been better. And yup, that animated Chaudhary
backstory isn't convincing at all!!
The casting is perfect. Emraan Hashmi is reliably restraint as Arjun,
the focal point of the series. Nandish Sandhu and Anurag Sinha (Prakash Kumar,
Hashmi's boss) leave a mighty impression. Nice to see our Marathi siren Amruta
Khanvilkar in a pivotal role here. Above all, Zoya Afroz is the true find of
the series, playing the saucy air-hostess Priya and delivering a splendid
performance. Her character reminded me of my favourite Pam Grier in Quentin
Tarantino's Jackie Brown (1997).
Taskaree: The Smuggler's Web is an imminently watch-worthy Netflix series. I would recommend
a binge watch as the basic screenplay is not typically episodic but more like a
movie... Bon voyage!!
- By Sumeet Nadkarni (film reviewer based in Mumbai)
No comments