Kaalkoot review: Vijay Verma’s pitch-perfect performance makes up for series’ lapses

Kaalkoot review: This web series tries delving into the social constructs that bind people and force them into unwanted situations, by asking a bunch of complex questions

Kaalkoot review: The web series stars Vijay Varma and Shweta Tripathi Sharma in the lead roles.

Written by Shubhra Gupta

July 28, 2023 01:56 PM IST

4 min read

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A young girl has acid thrown on her face. The case comes to a newbie cop on the verge of quitting. ‘Kaalkoot’, written by Arunabh Kumar and Sumit Saxena, and directed by the latter, is a police procedural which aims at showing us the human side of the law, as it goes about keeping a small North-Indian town crime-free. It also tries delving into the social constructs that bind people and force them into unwanted situations, by asking a bunch of complex questions: why does someone turn into a perpetrator of a heinous act? Why are some people destined to be victims?

I was intrigued enough by the attempt at aiming for the spot which is neither black, nor white, but somewhere in between, to stay with the eight-part web-series. But I had to work at it. “Kaalkoot’ would have been much better if it were tighter: the writing makes the scanty material stretch too much, and you find yourself getting impatient at the long loops. It is also a series which takes its stance of being pro-women, anti-patriarchy, anti-minorities, and anti-homophobia very seriously. These are welcome elements, given the times we live in. But again, you wish the lines were not quite so expository, and there are quite a few of those strewn through the series.

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But the performances make up for these lapses, almost. Right on top of the heap is Vijay Varma, who is pitch perfect as Ravi Shankar Tripathi, both as a man confronted with his own shortcomings, as well as a professional struggling to find the right path for himself. I haven’t enjoyed the previous two Varma outings, his serial killer coming off too bland in ‘Dahaad’, as well as his limp lecherous lover in ‘Lust Stories 2’. As the conflicted moral centre piercing the darkness of his surroundings, Varma is an absolute pleasure to watch. Both Yashpal Sharma, his more experienced colleague who works closely on the investigation, and Gopal Datt, his heavy-handed thana-in-charge but a good cop nonetheless, are excellent.

The hard life of women is laid bare – up for grabs if you smile too freely, judged if you want sexual freedom, rejected in the marriage mart if you have a chronic condition, living under the protection of the father-husband-and-son, taking permission to leave the house, at the other end of the vengeful male gaze– with solid acts from Seema Biswas, Shweta Tripathi Sharma, Suzanna Mukherjee among others. Homophobia comes up, as does female foeticide and unwanted pregnancies, and the series starts feeling too busy. Lines like this one — ‘ladka ghee ka ladoo hai, tedha medha hi sahi’– are flavourful but too many, as is the use of such descriptors as ‘baudam’ and ‘baklol’ that tell us that we are in East UP. Here’s another: ‘mard banane gaya tha, usne toh mujhe poora insaan banaa diya.’

The music is lovely, though, and adds a great deal of atmosphere to the series.

Kaalkoot cast: Vijay Varma, Shweta Tripathi Sharma, Yashpal Sharma, Seema Biswas, Gopal Datt, Suzanna Mukherjee
Kaalkoot director: Sumit Saxena

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