Badla

<p>Naina Sethi is a sharp, young businesswoman in London with a seemingly perfect life, until her world is turned upside down when she’s arrested for the murder of her lover, Arjun. Her lawyer, Jimmy Punjabi, hires renowned defence attorney Badal Gupta to help, and over the course of one evening, they work to uncover what really happened. Badal informs Naina that a witness will testify against her. Naina explains that she and Arjun were being blackmailed over their affair. They were summoned to a hotel, where she was attacked and later woke up to find Arjun dead, along with the money they had brought for the blackmailer. Although arrested, she’s currently out on bail. The police found no evidence of anyone else being in the room or breaking in. Badal suspects Naina is withholding the truth and presses her about the disappearance of a young man near the hotel. Naina then admits that a few months earlier, she and Arjun had gone to a cabin in the woods. On their way back, she accidentally hit another car, killing a young man named Sunny. Arjun convinced her not to report it, and they covered up the accident. They put Sunny’s body in his car’s trunk, which Naina later dumped in a swamp. While waiting for her, Arjun was invited into the home of a couple, Rani and Nirmal, who happened to be Sunny’s parents. Rani grew suspicious when she heard her son’s phone ring in Arjun’s pocket, as he had forgotten to get rid of it. Though Arjun and Naina managed to escape, they were worried they’d eventually be found out. Naina later saw news reports accusing Sunny of embezzling money from the bank where he worked before disappearing. She realised that Arjun had taken Sunny’s wallet and used his girlfriend’s credentials to hack the bank and frame Sunny. Rani eventually identified Naina’s car at the scene of her son’s disappearance, but Naina’s lawyer falsified an alibi. Although the police accepted it, Rani wasn’t convinced. She confronted Naina at a public event, begging her to reveal Sunny’s whereabouts, but Naina kept up her lie. Months later, she and Arjun were contacted by a blackmailer, leading to the events that got her arrested. Badal theorises that Rani killed Arjun, with Nirmal’s help since he worked at the hotel. Naina admits she saw Rani in the room but had lied to test Badal’s competence. Badal then reveals that there was no witness—he had made it up to get the truth from her. Now trusting him, Naina confesses a dark secret: Sunny had still been alive in the trunk when she dumped the car, but she chose to let him die to avoid getting caught. Shocked by her actions, Badal suggests that Naina, not Arjun, orchestrated the cover-up and framed Sunny. He speculates that Arjun, overcome with guilt, went to the hotel to confess to Rani and Nirmal, and Naina killed him to keep the truth hidden. Naina denies this, insisting that her earlier story is the real one. Badal refuses to defend Naina any further unless she admits to killing Arjun. Naina finally confesses, revealing where Sunny’s body is hidden. Badal agrees to continue helping her, but steps outside for a moment. Meanwhile, Naina receives a call from Jimmy and notices that Badal’s pen is disrupting the signal. Realizing something is wrong, she discovers that the man posing as Badal was an imposter when the real Badal Gupta arrives at her door. Horrified, Naina disassembles the pen, revealing a hidden voice recorder with her confessions. She looks out the window and sees the imposter and Rani in the apartment across from hers. The man posing as Badal removes his disguise, revealing himself as Nirmal. Rani then calls the police to have Naina arrested. The principal photography of the film began on 14 June 2018 in , Scotland. On 11 February 2019, , whose production house is producing the film, tweeted two first look posters of the film, one with Bachchan’s character and another with Pannu’s. The film was released on , 8 March 2019 and is available online on . The film was certified by with runtime of 118 minutes. Three unplugged innovative promotional videos which involved a conversation between and were launched on 3 March 2019, 6 March 2019 and 9 March 2019 respectively, which also featured , to promote the film. was published on 25 February 2019, on 28 February 2019, on 1 March 2019 and was published on 7 March 2019 on YouTube, featuring and respectively. The music of the film is composed by , and while the lyrics are penned by , , Siddhant Kaushal, Manoj Yadav, and Jizzy. , inspired by ‘s , rapped the song “Aukaat”. On the website , 63% of 16 critics’ reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6/10. Gaurang Chauhan reviewing for gave the film 3.5/5 stars and wrote, “Sujoy Ghosh delivers yet another interesting, enticing and an edge-of-the-seat mystery thriller.” Rachit Gupta of also rated the film with 3.5/5 stars saying, “The predictability of the screenplay dampens the thrills occasionally, also the climactic twist requires a healthy dose of suspense of disbelief. But, even the seasoned genre faithfuls will agree that ‘Badla’ offers a creative and thrilling end to a captivating mystery.” too gave it 3.5/5 stars, praising the direction and climax. gave the film 3.5 stars out of 5 and found the film and its star-cast, captivating and brilliant. of gave 3/5 stars and opined, “In a role that is right up his alley, Amitabh Bachchan is classy. Taapsee Pannu is right on the button as a cornered woman on the brink of a catastrophe, as is Amrita Singh as an aggrieved mother who has nothing to lose.” of gives 2.5/5 stars and remarked, remains watchable until the end but it doesn’t become essential viewing.” In its opening weekend, collected 273.8 million from domestic market. The film had a worldwide gross collection of 138.49 crore consisting of domestic gross of 103.88 crore and overseas gross of 34.61 crore.</p>