1.5 Stars (out of 4)
Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout leans into modern streaming video viewership habits. Every detail in this murder mystery is spelled out in such excruciating detail that you’d might as well be scrolling on your phone while you watch it. Full attention is not required.
Silence 2 is a sequel to the 2021 Zee5 Original Silence… Can You Hear It?. Familiarity with the first film isn’t required, as the sequel follows a new case, and the main characters’ personal lives are hardly mentioned.
Manoj Bajpayee plays ACP Avinash Verma, leader of Mumbai’s Special Crimes Unit (SCU) within the police force. Verma’s boss is aware of genre requirements and repeatedly threatens to disband the squad if they don’t produce results.
The SCU is assigned to investigate a mass shooting event at a dive bar. Verma’s first question is, “Did someone important die?” — as if the double-digit body count alone shouldn’t warrant his attention. Turns out a minister’s secretary is among the dead, and the minister fears it has something to do with a sensitive project he’s working on.
That’s a red herring. Verma and his crew — which includes Sanjana (Prachi Desai), Amit (Sahil Vaid), and Raj (Vaquar Shaikh) — quickly realize that the lone woman at the bar was the real target. She was an escort named Aazma (Surbhi Rohra). Soon enough, the squad is hot on the trail of human traffickers.
The crew exists in order to make every clue explicitly obvious. A coded message instructs someone to “Meet at Sam’s.” They narrow the search to a handful of buildings with names like Kaveri, Samruddhi, and Riddhi. Sanjana proudly connects the dots, “Samruddhi! SAM’S!”
Desai and the other actors playing squad members actually do a decent job delivering lines that require zero nuance. Same for Bajpayee, who gives a matter-of-fact performance. Parul Gulati — who plays a rich woman named Aarti — is the film’s unsung hero for managing to give a believable performance, when the material she’s given could’ve easily been interpreted in an over-the-top way.
That’s the mistake Dinker Sharma makes as cartoonishly theatrical business tycoon Arjun Chauhan. “Theatrical,” as in he wears a cape and holds a fake skull while reciting Hamlet’s “Poor Yorick” speech. Every moment he’s on screen is annoying.
Given that a few of the other supporting performances are hammy and irritating, too, Sharma might be doing exactly what writer-director Aban Bharucha Deohans wants. Regardless, this isn’t a film that any of the actors involved will want to emphasize on their highlight reels.
Links