Is Tapsee Pannu’s ‘Blurr’ the best pick for her debut as a producer?

• Platform: Zee5
• Release Date: 09/12/2022
• Cast: Taapsee Pannu, Gulshan Devaiah, Babita Anant 
• Director: Ajay Bahl

Blurr is an official remake of the 2010 Spanish thriller Julia’s Eyes and is Taapsee Pannu’s first foray into production. For me, she is the queen of Spanish remakes and biopics, and that too of a very similar kind in terms of thematic elements and atmosphere. So, it was not a surprise for me to see her pick up another Spanish thriller for her debut as a producer. She knows how to portray a character of this nature. She knows the atmosphere and the thematic elements that generally drive the narrative in a film like this. Also, the presence of enough thrills ensures that the audiences can be kept satisfied. 

Spanish films are not very popular in India and that ensures that most of Taapsee’s audiences haven’t seen the original, safeguarding the story and the surprises of her film to a large extent. But Taapsee’s choice also begs the question, wasn’t it too obvious of a character to pick for her debut as a producer? Wouldn’t she be better served to pick a more challenging role and film? Isn’t she getting too repetitive? In the answers to these questions lies the essence of Blurr and whether or not it is a film worthy of your time and energy.

The story revolves around twin sisters, Gautami and Gayatri played by Taapsee Pannu who both suffer from a rare ophthalmic disorder that leads to the gradual loss of vision. Gautami commits suicide in her house. Gayatri is not convinced that she committed suicide and starts investigating her sister’s death. She tries to gather information and piece together the last few days of Gautami’s life from accounts of her neighbors and evidence found at her home. While she is at it, she is gradually losing her vision adding an added layer of complexity to her already challenging pursuit. Will Gayatri get her vision back? Was her sister really murdered? Who was her killer? Is Gayatri’s husband involved in the crime? If yes, then why? Is something supernatural afoot in the case? These are some of the questions that drive the narrative of the film.   

One of the greatest strengths of Blurr is its constantly changing nature. While the film is essentially a whodunit thriller, it has enough in it to momentarily feel like a creepy supernatural horror, a slasher, and a morose drama about love and loss as it moves toward its culmination. The best thing about this quality is the fact that it is successful in pulling off each of these elements successfully that not only make the treatment and the execution of the film fresh throughout but also add a layer of intrigue to the already interesting plot. I was forced to think along different lines regarding the reason behind Gautami’s death. My thinking wandered between a serial killer on loose, something supernatural afoot, the two sisters imagining the things happening to them, and even a more abstract outcome of the mystery in line with Scorsese’s Shutter Island. The solution to the predicament provided in the end was rather simplistic and amounted to so much intrigue and surprise primarily because of how the director show us the proceedings. It is about what we see and what is left offscreen. This was an interesting approach to storytelling and I never felt cheated or underwhelmed by the end result.

Taapsee Pannu as the protagonist was once again proficient. She has played so many characters of this nature that now it has become too easy for her to slip behind the skin of such characters with clinical ease and organic realism. Sadly, her performance here is so similar to some of her previous roles that one can practically replace one with the other and this led to a feeling of déjà vu in everything that her character was shown doing. This lack of novelty was not something that makes a protagonist in a film special and in reality, robs the film of a lot of shine. It is difficult to point out any real flaws in her performance except her trademark dialogue delivery which remains the same in every character that she plays and needs to be looked at immediately. But there is also no defining factor in her essay here to make it memorable and special.  

The cinematography of the film is terrific. Its quality has to be addressed for two very different reasons. Firstly, the film looks sensationally beautiful even though the colors are washed away to a great extent. The morose mood and setting coupled with the lack of ease in the proceedings are captured beautifully by the cinematography that makes every frame look hauntingly beautiful but in a very gloomy way. The tragedy in the story is stamped in every frame of the film. The expressions of the actors are only an extension of the surroundings and the tragedy that they are in and it is documented well by how the characters and their world is captured. As the film changes its nature hopping between different genres, the cinematography contributes to the mood and the intrigue.

Secondly, the cinematography is effectively used to instill, fear, questions, horror, surprises, and intrigue using nothing more than imaginative angles to frame characters and situations. This was something that we don’t see too often in Bollywood. The director and the director of photography have to be given due credit for accomplishing this with success and workmanship. I am sure that they must have taken a leaf or two out of the original and this must have made life easier for them but it was still executed well in the film.

The background score and the editing of the film worked just as well for me. I have to admit that I did feel restless in a couple of moments in the first half of the film when I wanted to fast-forward to get to a certain point but that was primarily because I was watching the film on OTT. The film could have been shorter by about 10 -15 minutes which its Spanish counterpart was but that isn’t any major issue. The background score elevates our feeling of dread and uneasiness in key moments. One of my favorite scenes in the film was one in a wellness center where we see Taapsee amid some blind women who are gossiping about her dead sister and then suddenly realize that someone is in their midst. The way this scene unfolds sent a chill down my spine. I am confident that it will have a similar impact on most audiences. The editing is smart and contributes to making some of the more ordinary sequences special just because of how these sequences are edited and what we see unfold.

I had a good time with Blurr. It was a much better effort from Taapsee Pannu as an actor and ideator after the lackluster Dobaaraa. Ajay Bahl, the man who made the refreshing Section 375 brings his craft and art to a different genre and ensures that the film feels fresh, intriguing, and creepy when it wants to. I still believe that this was a film that was tailor-made for a theatrical release. Unfortunately, Taapsee Pannu’s Box-office record over the past few years must have instilled very little faith in the film’s theatrical success and so the studio decided to go to the OTT.

Rating: 3/5 (3 out of 5 Stars)

Please note that the views expressed in this article are that of the reviewer and do not in any way or form reflect EastMojo’s position.

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