Love You To Death (Hinglish): Black comedy has many witty moments

Produced by: Chiman Savla 

Directed by: Rafeeq Ellias

Music: Ronit chaterjee

Cast: Chandan Roy Danyal, Yuki Ellias, Suhasini Mulay, Kallol Banerjee, Nicholas Brown, Sheeba Chadha, Sohrab Ardeshir, Chetan Sashital, Sagar Salunke, Uday Chandra, Leonid Kudryavtsev, Graham Colley, Ella Kudryavtsev and others

It’s a passable black comedy. As in most black comedies, there is crime – lots of it. As in all films of this genre, there are shots of people in the loo, suggestive sequences and even a prolonged (for its needs) scene of a man throwing up with a close-up of the contents. The camera (by director Rafeeq Ellias himself) seems to deliberately linger on heroine and co-writer Yuki Ellias’ lower anatomy, trying peek-a-boo angles too often. But the big mercy is that there are no cusswords in this “Delhi Belly” meets “Sankat City” kind of film.

Nevertheless, the film as a whole works as a thriller, though the box-office will be a different proposition. Basically, “Love You To Death” is a satire and a dark thriller about a dysfunctional rich family. Family head Ravi (Kallol Banerjee) is into (pseudo-)intellectualism and consumes National Geographic DVDs and on the side, plots the murder of his wife Sundari (Suhasini Mulay), a dominating shrew who completely runs the life of son Atul (Chandan Roy Sanyal). 

Things are not okay between Atul and his heiress wife Sonia (Yuki Ellias), who finds life a loveless existence. Atul cannot “perform” because of his stresses and Sonia and her pet dog Baby seek remedial measures from tarot reader Maya (Sheeba Chadha) for their respective emotional and physical (the dog suffers from anorexia and insomnia!) problems. But what do you know? Maya is Ravi’s secret mistress!

Things come to a head when Sonia refuses to part with her huge land that she wants newfound eco-activist friend John (Nicholas Brown) to have for his environmental cause. Her husband wants it for his own business deal with an Israeli arms dealer Yuri (Leonid Kudryavtsev), much to the disgust of his son Moshe (Graham Colley) who is a “peacenik.” So now, mother and son are planning Sonia’s murder. The catalyst is a theater director (Chetan Shashital), who takes contracts for murder as he feels that that is also high art!

The dialogues (script credits to Rafeeq Ellias, Abhro Banerjee, Yuki Ellias, Pallu Newatia) are full of wit and deep satire and lift the film, providing multiple delightful moments. The technically simple movie is smartly edited and among the sequences that stand out are the funeral of the dog, the sequence in John’s eco-plant and the final, completely unexpected climax. 

Through all that, the film suddenly makes incisive points: how Nobel (as in Peace Prize) was the man who invented dynamite, and how nature makes sure that evil does not pay. On the other hand, the film deliberately makes its stand on some issues ambiguous, like environmental consciousness, subtly suggesting that however vital the cause, things can be overdone, which is always unhealthy!

Director Ellias keeps a tight grip on his storytelling, extracting great performances from all the featured actors, especially Chandan as Atul, Kallol Banerjee as his father, Suhasini Mulay as his mother and decidedly Yuki Ellias as the protagonist Sonia. Chetan Shashital pitches his theatre director to perfection – he is correctly camp. And Leonid Kudryavtsev as the arms dealer is perfect.

Rating: ***1/2