ISLAMABAD: After a number of disappointing productions towards the end of the year, Mohsin Ali’s directorial debut Chupan Chupai will serve as a welcome relief for Pakistani cinema-goers in 2018.

The film borrows its story from a Tamil film about five kidnappers – Babu (Ahsan Khan), Pari (Nelum Muneer), Koki (Ali Rizvi), Feddy (Zayed Sheikh) and Teeli (Wajdan Shah) – who make a living through petty crime.

The first half of the film follows Teeli, Feddy and Koki as they join together with Babu, a kidnapper, and his ghost-girlfriend Pari to plan something bigger after taking on unproductive petty crimes.

They group are approached by a vengeful businessman seeking to abduct the son of a minister, Aijaz Durrani (Talat Hussain), who had refused a bribe from the businessman’s brother and had him imprisoned.

It is only after they kidnap their target, Bobby (Faizan Khawaja) that they learn that Bobby had already planned his own separate abduction in order to extort his father until the gang disrupted his plan. Bobby now guides his kidnappers after they agree to share the ransom.

The minister initially refuses to pay the ransom, but Bobby uses his mother (Sakina Samo) to confront her husband about the kidnapping and eventually have the ransom delivered. Once the ransom has been paid, Bobby takes off with everything.

The truth of the matter is unearthed by Inspector Chaudhry (Adnan Jaffer), who begins to chase the kidnappers, and whose hold on the gang is broken by Khan (Rehan Sheikh).

The film emerges as a winner as soon as it introduces its three leads. Despite a cast of veterans such as Talat Hussain, Sakina Sumo, Adnan Jaffer and Rehan Sheikh, the credit for the film’s success goes to the five kidnappers, who hold the audience’s attention throughout the film and carry the story forward.

Credit also goes to Mohsin Ali, for holding the audience’s interest for the entire runtime. The introduction of new characters after every 20 to 30 minutes while keeping the continuity of the film intact is highly commendable – particularly for a debut director.

The set and costume design for the film were, for the most part, simple and generic, and every character introduced in the story – from Inspector Chaudhry to Bobby’s mother, minister Durrani and even Khan, plays a part in keeping the film going.

On the whole, Chupan Chupai is a film with a gripping storyline, right punches, apt editing and solid acting.

Published in Dawn, December 31st, 2017