The evening of 8th December, 2016. The world for a lot of Indian people changed when the country's Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that the government would be discontinuing the then-in-circulation big denomination notes of 500 and 1,000 Rupees with immediate effect, in a bid to fight black money and counterfeit currency. This left many a people in the lurch, their stockpile of unaccounted black cash almost immediately amounting to nothing but useless pieces of paper. This led to a new enterprise of people trying to exchange the older notes for the newly introduced ones at a premium commission. It is in this chaotic situation that debutant director sets the story of his first feature “1888”.
“1888” review is part of the Submit Your Film Initiative
In the aftermath of the announcement of demonetization, popular actress-turned-politician Sandhya Shetty is stuck with a conundrum as she looks to get a large sum of old notes changed to the new legal tender. When all attempts fail, she, like a lot of other people across the country, decides it best to burn the sum instead. However, when her cronies set out to do the deed, they are attacked by local goon Prathap, who manages to overpower them and take the bag for himself. Before he can make away with the currency, he is caught in the act by Vikas, who demands half the money. Taking a liking to Vikas, Prathap decides to share with him and the two embark on a journey to try and get the denominations exchanged.
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Shukla directs a feature that is essentially a film of two different halves. The first is dedicated to the teaming up of these two oddball characters who come together, for different reasons, and need to find a way to make it work for themselves. This half plays like a road movie where, after the setup, not much happens as we get to know these two characters, their backstories and motivations. As their journey progresses, the feature introduces a few characters that would go on to define the outcome of their trip, but the focus never wavers from the two leads. Through various incidents, Shukla manages to include a number of real-life incidents involving currency notes that became well-known throughout the country during those trying times.
Shortly after the two leads reach their destination, the narrative does a 180 turn and what was essentially a road trip movie until that point becomes a thriller involving the Intelligence Bureau, India's internal security and counterintelligence agency. This is an interesting direction and Shukla for his part seems to have done a fair amount of research on the matter to provide at least a satisfying narrative to the otherwise uninitiated. The transition between the two however does end up being a bit jarring and sudden, enough to jolt the audience, but not necessarily in the right way. Besides this little hiccup, this injection of intrigue helps keep the story interesting and the audience invested.
For the majority of the roles in his debut work, Shukla enlists mostly newcomers and herein lies the production's biggest drawback, with most of the performances coming across as rather amateurish, even off-putting at times. While it does show the actors, including Manju Raj as Prathap and Prathap Kumar as Vikas, trying earnestly, the end results sadly do not impress much. This is not to say that they are outright bad, but they fail to leave much of a mark. Even the performance from the otherwise experienced Neethu Shetty, who plays the actress-politician Sandhya, feels of an inferior quality. It is, however, to Manju Raj's credit that he is rather effective in the action sequences handed to him, which are surprisingly, rather well choreographed and executed.
“1888” opens with a note that the feature has been produced in guerrilla fashion and goes on to explain what that means in the context of this work and to that effect, it manages to be a decent showcase of director Shukla's abilities to make the most of what has been handed to him. The narrative is expansive in the grounds it covers, and Pradeep Dorai's cinematography does an effective job of putting the audience in the chaotic and unpredictable journey with our leads. A bigger budget and a crispier image could have worked in its favour, but the camerawork, especially in the confines of the car, is adequate. The same goes for Puneet Hathur's music, but the most impressive has to be the aforementioned action choreography, which really is the surprise element, as is Raj's performance with them.
Ultimately, “1888” may not be a perfect debut work as it is certainly rough around the edges and the performances do fail to be impactful, but it is nonetheless a good showcase of Sourabh Shukla's abilities as a director and of the achievements that can be attained even with a skeletal crew and a limited budget with an able hand behind the camera.
