Review : The Silence…Can You Hear It : Neatly crafted suspense!
Murder mysteries have always been liked by the audience and if the suspense in it is unimaginable then it clicks with the viewers in a big way. The ‘whodunnit’ cop-story of The Silence…Can You Hear It does create neatly crafted suspense and keeps the viewers guessing till the last minute. Written and directed by Aban Bharucha Deohans it has created the sense of intrigue. She has managed to guard the suspense till the end and when audience feels that the case is solved, she throws another surprise foxing the anticipating audience. Her ‘taking’ seems influenced by the Hollywood movies and it’s a compliment.
The movie opens with four collegians trekking on a hill suddenly hear a cell phone ring. Trying to find out where it’s coming from they stumble upon a dead body of a young girl. Frightened they call the cops and it’s understood that the deceased is Pooja (Barkha Singh) a daughter of a well known Justice Chaudhary (Shishir Sharma). He requests and recommends to the Commissioner of Police, ACP Avinash Verma’s (Manoj Bajpayee) name to solve this murder mystery which has no clues or witnesses or evidence. ACP Verma forms a team which consists of four officers (including Vaquar Shaikh, Sahil Vaid) including a lady’s officer Sanjana Vatia (Prachi Desai). Pooja, before her murder, had spent time in the house of an MLA Ravi Khanna (Arjun Mathur). Point of suspicion is Mr Khanna but intelligent viewers know that it can’t be open and shut case and they are right. One evidence leads to another and within a week ACP Verma manages to solve the case fighting many obstacles.
The scripting is good and the last fifteen minutes are well written where the real suspense unfolds. Aban Bharuch Deohans keeps the audience guessing and springs unexpected surprise at the climax. Bharucha Deohans’s screenplay withholds its aces, keeping its surprises till the very end which is the highlight of the film. In between the movie seems to drag because of it’s verboseness wherein some action scenes would have helped the impact the film expects to create. The pace of the film (136m) should have been hastened a bit because it loses grip in between a few scenes. But the director keeps the viewers hooked to the screen till the very last moment and invested in it’s characters.
The current political and police controversies have the tongues wagging but the police officer Avinash in the film seems to be the last honest officer left in the police force. Of dry wit and extraordinary powers of deduction, Avinash proves to be a fine investigator, willing to use unorthodox methods to nab the murderer. Manoj Bajpayee has yet again delivered an outstanding performance. His portrayal reminds one of his role in The Family Man. Prachi Desai makes a comeback with this movie and she has done a fabulous job. Her good looks doesn’t hamper her uniformed character and her ‘I am a cop, sir’, dialogue (in good humour) reminds the concern shown towards female employees. Sahil Vaid, Vaquar Shaikh, Barkha Singh, Shishir Sharma and others have delivered good performances and Arjun Mathur portrays his role very convincingly.
The Silence …Can You Hear It keeps one invested in the plot as well as the characters.