By Chirag Sehgal,News18,Yatamanyu Narain

Copyright news18

Black comedy has always been the rebellious child of Hindi cinema, too slippery to tame, too strange to fit neatly into formulas, and often dismissed as a sideshow when it deserves the spotlight. At its worst, the genre collapses into cartoonish buffoonery, its edges dulled by excess. At its best, it becomes a razor, slicing into the hypocrisies of society while wearing the disarming mask of humour. Umesh Shukla’s Ek Chatur Naar belongs to the latter camp. It does not merely entertain; it toys, teases, and twists, transforming everyday desperation into a carnival of chaos.
Hilarious, quirky, and deliciously unpredictable, the film thrives in contradiction. It draws you in with its buoyant laughter but leaves you squirming at the rot it exposes beneath. Like its spiritual cousins Ghanchakkar and Blackmail, it is equal parts satire and suspense. Yet Shukla imbues it with his own rhythm, crafting a tale that feels both folkloric and fresh, a modern parable draped in the colours of Lucknow and painted with the brushstrokes of absurdity.
At the centre of this darkly comic labyrinth stands Mamta (Divya Khosla Kumar), a woman whose life is stitched together with scraps of resilience. Widowed, saddled with a loan of 20 lakhs, and raising her son Sonu while sparring daily with creditors, she lives with her eccentric mother-in-law Radha Rani (Chhaya Kadam), a woman who treats liquor like medicine and Naagin reruns like sacred scripture. Their household, though burdened, vibrates with humour, a strange symphony of survival and silliness.
But Mamta is no tragic heroine. She is a fox in a cage, sharp-eyed and cunning, her mind always searching for an escape hatch. By day, she monitors the ebb and flow of commuters at Lucknow Metro; by night, she plots ways to outwit a world determined to keep her cornered.
Enter Abhishek Verma (Neil Nitin Mukesh), a man whose morality is as slippery as oil on marble. He cheats on his wife with his colleague Tina (Heli Daruwala), manipulates funds at Direct Fund Consultancy, and slithers his way into the confidence of Home Minister Qureishi (Zakir Hussain), who is no stranger to scams. Abhishek dreams of political power, but his ladder is made of lies.
And then comes the pivot. His phone is stolen by a burqa-clad woman. A mundane act, yet it detonates the plot like a grenade. For this theft is no accident. Mamta, with her unseen allies, orchestrates it with precision. At first, the phone becomes a birthday trinket for her son. But inside, she stumbles upon a Pandora’s box: a sex tape of Abhishek and Tina, and a treasure trove of incriminating secrets. What begins as curiosity becomes conspiracy, as Mamta decides to extort two crores from Abhishek, a sum that could rescue her from ruin.
The chase that follows is not just cat and mouse. It is panther and cobra, owl and fox, predator and prey trading places in a dizzying dance of deceit.
Shukla’s greatest triumph lies in his pacing. He resists the temptation of clutter. Instead, he lets the story breathe, sketching each character with deliberate strokes before setting them into collision. The first half unfurls like a game board, introducing the players, laying the stakes, sprinkling humour like seasoning, and then tightening the noose just enough before the interval.
The second half is a masterclass in controlled chaos. The dialogues sparkle with wit and irony, laced with earthy humour that is unafraid to get its hands dirty. The screenplay is taut, resisting convolution while still surprising at every turn. At one point, the film tips its hat to Hera Pheri, a sly acknowledgement that it stands in the lineage of great Hindi comedies, even as it forges its own identity.
Tone is everything in black comedy, and Ek Chatur Naar nails it. The film does not mock its darkness with slapstick, nor does it drown its humour in despair. Instead, it balances on the knife-edge between absurdity and authenticity, allowing the ridiculousness of circumstance to generate laughter while the stakes remain dead serious.
Divya Khosla astonishes. In Mamta, she finds a role rich with contradictions: mother and manipulator, victim and schemer, soft-hearted and sharp-tongued. She portrays the weight of single motherhood, the ache of lost love, and the fire of cunning survival with remarkable conviction. Her Awadhi accent wobbles at times, but her emotional authenticity never does. This is easily her most layered performance to date.
Neil Nitin Mukesh sinks his teeth into Abhishek Verma, relishing the role of a man corrupted to the marrow. His performance slithers between arrogance and panic, menace and cowardice. Watching him unravel under Mamta’s grip is a spectacle in itself. Together, the two actors create a push-and-pull of tension that electrifies the film.
Chhaya Kadam is a riot as Radha Rani, turning what could have been comic relief into a living, breathing character who is as endearing as she is unhinged. Zakir Hussain as Qureishi is delightfully slippery, a politician whose smile feels like a blade. Sushant Singh brings weary gravitas as Inspector Triloki, Yashpal Sharma menaces as Thakur, and the supporting cast fills the canvas with texture and depth.
The finale deserves standing ovations. Without spilling the secret, suffice it to say that the twist is not merely a surprise, it is the logical crescendo of everything before it, executed with audacity and precision. It is the kind of ending that leaves you reeling, replaying the film in your mind, marvelling at how the pieces were hiding in plain sight.
Even the soundtrack shows restraint. No jarring item numbers or unnecessary interludes, only a haunting leitmotif sung by Kailash Kher and composed by Vayu and Sharan Rawat, lingering like an echo after the lights dim.
Ek Chatur Naar is more than a film, it is a sly wink at our times. Beneath its humour lies a mirror, reflecting the desperation of those cornered by circumstance and the corruption of those who profit from it. It entertains relentlessly, yet leaves a sting, reminding us that survival often demands trickery, and morality is a luxury few can afford.
With airtight writing, a stellar cast, and the courage to walk the tightrope between satire and suspense, Umesh Shukla has crafted one of the finest black comedies of recent memory. It makes you laugh, it makes you squirm, and just when you think you have outsmarted it, it pulls the rug with a flourish.
This is not disposable entertainment. Ek Chatur Naar is cinema at its wicked best: intelligent, daring, and intoxicating. It is a film that deserves not just your attention but your astonishment.