'Kaashi in Search of Ganga' Movie Review: Varanasi's Atmospheric Lighting During The Evening Aarti Adds Aesthetic Value

Kaashi (Sharman Joshi) a corpse burner who lives on the banks of the river Ganges in Varanasi. Despite caste and class differences, he catches the attention of Devina (Aishwarya Devan) a journalist, who is in the holy city in search of a story. The twist to their blooming love story comes when Devina tells Kaashi that his college-going sister Ganga (Priyanka Singh) is missing. 

The script is not well-chiselled and the tale though intriguing, appears to be ridiculous and convolutedly mounted with predictable scenes, for most of its length. Hence, the audience who have no patience with the narrative, would crack up soon and dismiss the film midway. Manish Kishore’s story is outrageously bad. It could’ve actually been a decent thriller only if it was brushed well. It’s so naive and juvenile at places you can’t do anything but laugh at the situation of you getting in that cinema hall. With horrendous dialogues such as “Zindagi guzaarne ke liye, dost ki nahi, hamsafar ki zaroorat hoti hai, mere hamsafar banoge toh bolo,” and “Aaj kal ki ladkiyo ko ho kya gaya hai, they’re spoilt”, the writing of the movie is a torture. Sharman is seen sharpening a spoon in the start which he uses to kill the audience by the end of the film.

Intezaar hua khatam, aaj #Kaashi ko Ganga zaroor milegi! Watch #KaashiInSearchOfGanga in theatres near you, book your tickets now. https://t.co/7E6Tt3v8xt@TheSharmanJoshi @aishwaryadevan3 @Director_dhiraj @ManishKiishore @InsiteIndia pic.twitter.com/thjfd7E6gx

— Kaashi In Search Of Ganga (@KaashiTheFilm) October 26, 2018

On the performance front, Sharman with his boy-next-door looks, slips into the shoes of his character with unquestionable ease and sincerity. His anger, frustration and anxiety to find his sister is palpable in the scenes where he confronts those he suspects to have kidnapped his sister.  Dewan, who makes her debut in Hindi cinema, has a significant role compared to what is usually assigned to female leads in such films and is fairly convincing for the large part. But every one-scene-extra in this film is out to steal the scene by hamming their heads off. And with a supporting cast that does everything but that, the leads eventually give way.

During the courtroom drama, Manoj Joshi as Kaashi's lawyer Vinod Sinha and Akhilendra Mishra as Balwant Pandey's advocate Nagendra Mishra, have their moments of on-screen glory. Overall, given the perspective of the protagonist, there appears no better way that the director could have staged this tale. There are films which are bad but qualify for the trashy category because if the unintentional humour they produce. Kaashi has couple of such moments but rest of the time it’s a big fat bore.