As a film, it is better than good, and as a first film of a director, it is better than even that. To the point, sans melodrama, sans gimmicks, following a genre and yet not suffused with tropes, Nikita Roy is a clever piece of entertainment that balances manoranjan with craft as well as a social comment.
Spiritual leader Amardev (Paresh Rawal) has a loyal clientele and followers in London, but Sanal Roy (Arjun Rampal) of the Rationalist Society suspects that all is not above board. He plants Freya (Kallirroi Tziafeta) there as a follower and plans to expose the man. However, before he can do that, he dies an untimely death, after ghastly and ghostly things happen to him.
His sister, Nikita Roy (Sonakshi Sinha), devoted to him and then in India, is summoned to London. She point-black refuses to believe that his death was either an accident or suicide, and when Sanal’s colleagues in the Society dissuade her from investigating Amardev, begins her own inquiries, aided by Sanal’s friend who has also always loved her, Jolly (Suhail Nayyar).
The first stop is obviously Freya’s far-out cottage, but in front of them, the seemingly-possessed girl slits her own throat. It is now time for Nikita to confront Amardev, who coolly tells her that she has just three days to live when Nikita threatens to expose him within a week.
So what is the mystery’s solution? Is it Amardev doing something in the occult department? Is there more? What evil force acted on Sanal and Freya and has now begun to act on Nikita too?
A tight under-two hours thriller, Nikita Roy is a vast improvement on recent (coincidentally) UK-based thrillers revolving around heroines (Savi, Ulajh, The Buckingham Murders) in terms of story and content. It has a neat plot, without loose ends or loopholes, and the only weakness is that the denouement, though sensible, is too hasty and possibly a tad complicated for the layman. In this matter, the scriptwriters including the director err significantly for the Indian audience.
Except for this, Kussh S. Sinha’s debut as a director is easily among the brightest ones this year. The cinematography (Anshul Chobey), production design (Sunil Nigvekar) and editing (Ritesh Soni) are of high standards, and the BGM (Amar Mohile) is better than Mohile’s normal over-the-top standards.
The script is tight, devoid of cliches, and the dialogues sharp and to the point. As always, the songs are forgettable.
Sonakshi Sinha is absolutely fantastic in the title-role and Paresh Rawal, sorry to employ the contrasting word, is divine! Arjun Rampal and Kallirroi Tziafeta score high, and Suhail Nayyar is perfectly in-sync as Jolly.
In a milieu where overconfident producers have under-promoted the film, one wishes that this movie had released directly on OTT. It deserved much better than the reception it is likely to get and could have been another Jaane Jaan (2023) in terms of audience viewership as well as critical acclaim.
Rating: ***1/2
Nicky Vicky Bhagnani Films’, Kratos Entertainment’s, Nikita Pai Films’ & Vipin Agnihotri Films’ Nikita Roy Produced by: Nicky Bhagnani, Vicky Bhagnani, Kinjal Ghone, Dinesh Gupta, Ankur Takrani & Vipin Agnihotri Directed by: Kussh S. Sinha Written by: Pavan Kirpalani, Kussh S. Sinha, Neel Mohanty, Ankur Takrani & Belal Khalique Music: Abhinav Shekhar Starring: Sonakshi Sinha, Paresh Rawal, Arjun Rampal, Suhail Nayyar, Kallirroi Tziafeta, Supreet Bedi, Kumall Grewal, Paul Coster, Beau Baptist, Calin Bleau & others
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