420 IPC review: A Must Watch Edge of the Seat Drama!

420 IPC

Producer: Zee5 and Kyoorius P.L

Director: Manish Gupta

Cast: Rohan Vinod Mehra, Gul Panag, Ranvir Shorey, Vinay Pathak, Arif Zakaria

Streaming on: Zee5

Rating:

By Jyothi Venkatesh

The best thing that I can say about this cute but intelligent film is that it is a good watch that doesn’t lag or bore you with any unnecessary or unwanted elements like a romantic or sad song or a comedy track forced into the narrative. This one is an out of the box though slow-burning yet thoroughly engaging suspense courtroom drama involving a chartered accountant Bansi Keswani (Vinay Pathak ) who lives with his wife Pooja (Gul Panag) and only son Amit (Shush Kalra) but is caught unawares all of a sudden when he is caught in a high level cheque forgery case. To fight his case, Bansi Keswani hires a young inexpensive but efficient lawyer Birbal Chaudhary (Rohan Vinod Mehra), who discovers that the case is very complicated and there is more to it than meets the eye.

The film opens at the office of Mumbai Metropolitan Road Development Authority where Bansi is visiting his client, Deputy Director, Sandesh Bhonsale (Mahesh Pillai) to discuss ITR filing for him and his family. Soon after he returns home, Bansi is shocked when his wife Pooja apprises him of the bank’s eviction notice for failing to pay the last few EMIs of the home loan. Even as they’re trying to figure out a way out of this crisis, CBI officers swoop down on his door. After a thorough search of his house, they ask him to accompany them to their office. That’s where Bansi learns about Bhonsale’s arrest for siphoning off Rs 1200 crore in the Airoli Flyover Scam.

Though Bansi is let off since they don’t find anything incriminating him and  he goes about his work as usual,, one afternoon, the cops arrest him from his office for stealing cheques from his builder client, Sinha (Arif Zakaria), and also charge him of forgery and bank fraud. Though circumstantial evidence stacks against him, Bansi maintains he’s innocent and his lawyer Birbal bails him out despite strong opposition from Public Prosecutor Sewak Jamshedji (Ranvir Shorey).

Watch the 420 IPC trailer here:

Writer-director Manish Gupta‘s story and screenplay are engaging, and there is hardly any dull moment in the film. Cinematography and music also gel well with the film. Full marks ought to go to Manish Gupta for making difficult sections of the law very easy to understand for the viewers.

As far as the performances go, while Vinay Pathak is impressive as usual, Gul Panag scores as the distressed house-wife. Ranvir Shorey is effective with his dialogue delivery and gait and accent, while Arif Zakaria emerges as a negative force with vengeance. However, all said and done, I should say that Rohan Vinod Mehra shines in his impactful role. Overall, in the lines of earlier films on the web like The Big Bull and Scam 92, IPC 420 is also a must-watch film on economic frauds.