Who Killed Shastri ?|Apr. 12, 2019|India|144 Min.|Not Rated
Genre: Bollywood;Drama;Mystery;Thriller
Description: Vivek Agnihotri’s *The Tashkent Files* opens with a dedication to “all honest journalists of India,” immediately setting the tone for the filmmaker’s critique of institutions and ideologies he believes have harmed the nation. Through his characters, he labels NGOs as “social terrorists,” Supreme Court judges as “judicial terrorists,” writers and historians as “intellectual terrorists,” and the media as “TRP terrorists.” The film centers around the mysterious death of India’s second Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri, presenting conspiracy theories that could have made for an intriguing thriller. However, Agnihotri uses the narrative to challenge leftist, secular, and socialist ideologies, often in an unintentionally humorous manner. The movie incorporates terms like “anti-national,” “presstitutes,” and “fake news,” often associated with the current political regime, while attempting to balance arguments through a historian character, Aiysha (Pallavi Joshi). The inclusion of Naseeruddin Shah, a vocal critic of the government, as a cunning minister adds another layer. The film’s agenda becomes evident in its climax, focusing heavily on the Emergency era, though Agnihotri’s attempts at subtlety fall short.
Cast director: Vivek Agnihotri
Cast actor: Naseeruddin Shah, Mithun Chakraborty, Shweta Prasad, Asif Basra, Mandira Bedi, Pallavi Joshi, Rajesh Sharma, Vinay Pathak, Pankaj Tripathi, Prakash Belawadi
Original name: The Tashkent Files