A Brutal Crime Thriller with Predictable Beats

Arshad Warsi and Akshay Kumar in Jolly LLB 3 (2025)

Arshad Warsi and Jitendra Kumar in Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas (2025)

Harsh Purwar in Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas (2025)

Harsh Purwar, Sandeep Yadav, and Devas Dixit in Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas (2025)

Hemant Saini in Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas (2025)

Arshad Warsi

Jitendra Kumar

Ayesha Kaduskar

Bhavini Bheda

Sumit Saxena

Inspector Bhagwat gets transferred to a small town in UP, where he takes up the case of a missing girl. Meanwhile, Sameer is in love with Meera and plans to elope. How do their lives intersect?

Akshay Shere

Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas

🔍🌾Tense Small-Town Thriller With Uneven Beats 🔍

Akshay Shere&apos;s debut feature arrives with modest ambitions and delivers a serviceable, if ultimately frustrating, small-town crime thriller. Set in the dusty, sun-bleached streets of Robertsganj, Uttar Pradesh in 2009, the film benefits enormously from its two leads. Arshad Warsi brings a lived-in weariness to Inspector Bhagwat, a cop who&apos;s seen enough to be cynical but retains just enough idealism to make promises he might not keep. There&apos;s a quiet intensity in Warsi&apos;s performance, especially in the interrogation scenes where his frustration bleeds through controlled aggression. He doesn&apos;t grandstand, which makes his occasional eruptions of violence feel earned rather than theatrical. Jitendra Kumar is the film&apos;s secret weapon. As Samir, he navigates a tricky tonal tightrope with impressive dexterity. One moment he&apos;s all boyish charm and romantic persistence, the next he&apos;s cornered and desperate, his eyes darting between defiance and genuine terror. Kumar has always been a chameleon, but here he&apos;s asked to be likable and suspicious in equal measure, and he nails it. The scenes where Bhagwat interrogates him crackle with tension precisely because Kumar makes you question everything you&apos;ve seen before. Ayesha Kaduskar&apos;s Meera is less developed, functioning more as a narrative device than a fully realized character, though Kaduskar does what she can with limited screen time. Bhavini Bheda&apos;s screenplay starts strong, establishing the rhythms of police work in a town where resources are scarce and institutional support is practically nonexistent. The first hour moves with procedural confidence. Shere&apos;s direction leans into the grit without overdoing it, the cinematography favoring natural light and handheld camerawork that gives everything a documentary-like immediacy. The production design captures the specific texture of tier-three Indian towns, where modernity and tradition exist in uneasy proximity. You can almost feel the heat and dust. But once the central mystery reveals itself, the film loses momentum. The problem isn&apos;t the revelation itself, it&apos;s that the script doesn&apos;t seem to know what to do afterward. The pacing, so assured in the buildup, becomes sluggish. Scenes that should crackle with urgency feel perfunctory. There&apos;s a sense that Shere and Bheda painted themselves into a corner and had to scramble for an exit. The editing grows uneven, with certain sequences lingering too long while others feel rushed. The sound design does solid work throughout, using ambient noise to build atmosphere, but even that can&apos;t compensate for a narrative running out of steam. The film&apos;s treatment of violence is matter-of-fact, neither glorifying nor condemning the third-degree methods Bhagwat employs. It&apos;s an interesting choice that adds moral complexity, though the script never quite digs into the ethical implications as deeply as it could. Thematically, the film toys with ideas about truth, evidence, and the gulf between suspicion and proof, but it doesn&apos;t commit fully to exploring them. There&apos;s a more provocative film lurking beneath this one. This will appeal most to viewers who enjoy procedural thrillers with strong character work and don&apos;t mind when the plot mechanics show their seams. It&apos;s not a film that reinvents the wheel, and its reluctance to fully embrace its darker impulses keeps it from being truly memorable. Still, the performances alone make it worth watching, and there&apos;s enough craft on display to suggest Shere could deliver something more assured with his next outing. It&apos;s a frustrating watch in some ways, a film that does so much right in its first two acts that you can&apos;t help but wish it had stuck the landing.

Inspector Vishwas Bhagwat, battling personal demons and his anger issues, investigates the case of missing girls. His journey intersects with Sameer, a charming man in love. What connects the two?

Bhagwat Chapter One - Raakshas Trailer on Zee5

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BODE4YjYwNTQtNzk1ZC00YTkxLThjNTYtNjczNTZmYTY4NzRlXkEyXkFqcGdeQXRyYW5zY29kZS13b3JrZmxvdw@@._V1_.jpg

Akshay Shere's debut feature arrives with modest ambitions and delivers a serviceable, if ultimately frustrating, small-town crime thriller. Set in the dusty, sun-bleached streets of Robertsganj, Uttar Pradesh in 2009, the film benefits enormously from its two leads. Arshad Warsi brings a lived-in weariness to Inspector Bhagwat, a cop who's seen enough to be cynical but retains just enough idealism to make promises he might not keep. There's a quiet intensity in Warsi's performance, especially in the interrogation scenes where his frustration bleeds through controlled aggression. He doesn't grandstand, which makes his occasional eruptions of violence feel earned rather than theatrical. Jitendra Kumar is the film's secret weapon. As Samir, he navigates a tricky tonal tightrope with impressive dexterity. One moment he's all boyish charm and romantic persistence, the next he's cornered and desperate, his eyes darting between defiance and genuine terror. Kumar has always been a chameleon, but here he's asked to be likable and suspicious in equal measure, and he nails it. The scenes where Bhagwat interrogates him crackle with tension precisely because Kumar makes you question everything you've seen before. Ayesha Kaduskar's Meera is less developed, functioning more as a narrative device than a fully realized character, though Kaduskar does what she can with limited screen time. Bhavini Bheda's screenplay starts strong, establishing the rhythms of police work in a town where resources are scarce and institutional support is practically nonexistent. The first hour moves with procedural confidence. Shere's direction leans into the grit without overdoing it, the cinematography favoring natural light and handheld camerawork that gives everything a documentary-like immediacy. The production design captures the specific texture of tier-three Indian towns, where modernity and tradition exist in uneasy proximity. You can almost feel the heat and dust. But once the central mystery reveals itself, the film loses momentum. The problem isn't the revelation itself, it's that the script doesn't seem to know what to do afterward. The pacing, so assured in the buildup, becomes sluggish. Scenes that should crackle with urgency feel perfunctory. There's a sense that Shere and Bheda painted themselves into a corner and had to scramble for an exit. The editing grows uneven, with certain sequences lingering too long while others feel rushed. The sound design does solid work throughout, using ambient noise to build atmosphere, but even that can't compensate for a narrative running out of steam. The film's treatment of violence is matter-of-fact, neither glorifying nor condemning the third-degree methods Bhagwat employs. It's an interesting choice that adds moral complexity, though the script never quite digs into the ethical implications as deeply as it could. Thematically, the film toys with ideas about truth, evidence, and the gulf between suspicion and proof, but it doesn't commit fully to exploring them. There's a more provocative film lurking beneath this one. This will appeal most to viewers who enjoy procedural thrillers with strong character work and don't mind when the plot mechanics show their seams. It's not a film that reinvents the wheel, and its reluctance to fully embrace its darker impulses keeps it from being truly memorable. Still, the performances alone make it worth watching, and there's enough craft on display to suggest Shere could deliver something more assured with his next outing. It's a frustrating watch in some ways, a film that does so much right in its first two acts that you can't help but wish it had stuck the landing.

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