Cast: Vijay Varma, Kritika Kamra, Sai Tamhankar, Bhupendra Jadawat, Siddharth Jadhav
Creator: Abhay Koranne, Nagraj Popatrao Manjule
Director: Nagraj Popatrao Manjule
Streaming On: Prime Video
Language: Hindi
Runtime: 8 episodes of 50 minutes each
“Jungle mein sher maans soonghta hai to baaki toli naachti hai. Kyun? Kyunki sabko pata hai ki khana milne wala hai,” tells a sharp and confident Brij Bhatti, who wants to rule the gambling world, to a local money-lender goon. And with this dialogue, Vijay Varma opens the first season of Matka King – a web series directed by Nagraj Manjule, based on the life of Ratan Khatri, a Mumbai-based businessman who ruled the betting world!
Set in the 1960s, the show tells the story of an ordinary cotton trader, Brij Bhatti, played by Vijay Varma, who devises a new way of gambling that takes Mumbai by storm. It’s a rags-to-riches tale of a man who builds an empire out of numbers, but soon realizes that holding onto the crown is harder than winning it. Set against the backdrop of a rapidly evolving Bombay in the 1960s, the show traces the rise of a common man, who realizes that the masses don’t want to work for money – they want to dream of it.
Matka King Review: What’s It About:
The series is split into 8 episodes that show the progression of a man who takes charge of his life and turns it into a success, if financial gains can be defined as success. In one of the episodes, a character says – Ameer ho ya Gareeb, sabka petrol ek hi hai – Ummeed. The show builds its premise on this one dialogue; however, as it spreads its wings and dives into Brij Bhatti’s personal life, everything, including the screenplay, starts turning into a mess!
Matka King Review: What Works:
Bhatti introduces Matka, a very interesting gambling game that traps the lower class and tries to be its messiah, only that it is a trap! Brij Bhatti decides to start this gambling game after a fallout with his employer, Lalji Bhai. What starts as a revenge business turns into an empire when Brij Bhatti finds a way to let the struggling working class believe that he is helping them gain financially! However, as he builds an empire based on honesty toward his punters, his personal life becomes a web of lies and dishonesty! He is an imaandaar businessman in a rigged world, but a dhokhebaaz man in his own home. It’s a classic rise-and-fall saga that attempts to portray a gray man split in two.
Matka King Review: Star Performance:
Vijay Varma is effortlessly brilliant. He brings a certain authenticity to Brij Bhatti, making even the most mundane scenes watchable. Meanwhile, Sai Tamhankar provides the emotional anchor the show desperately needs. Kritika Kamra as Gulrukh plays the anchor in Brij Bhatti’s life, and she commands the screen. She brings grace and a certain mystery to her character, but the writing doesn’t give her enough meat. The ensemble of the series is its greatest strength! The entire supporting cast, right from Siddharth Jadhav playing the right-hand to Girish Kulkarni playing a sincere journalist, every character shines in this web series. But it is only the script that starts losing the plot after the first three episodes that set the narrative at a very high pedestal! Gulshan Grover’s character comes across as the weakest despite being one of the most important ones!
Matka King Review: What Doesn’t Work:
When you walk into a project helmed by Nagraj Manjule, you expect a certain socio-political sting. You expect the man who gave us the raw emotions of Sairat and the undying spirit of Jhund. Unfortunately, Matka King is Manjule’s weakest work to date. The direction keeps falling into a confused spiral, trying to strike a balance between reality and glamor! The gritty, grounded storytelling is Manjule’s signature, but it is replaced here by a confused narrative pace.
The series fumbles through its mid-section, unable to decide if it’s a thriller, a biopic, or a daily soap. Even Amit Trivedi’s music does not help one bit, and it is a massive letdown. It fails to blend with the heartbeat of Bombay of the 60s. Instead of elevating the drama, the songs keep stumbling alongside a script that is already struggling to keep its pace.
Matka King Review: Last Words:
In one of the scenes, Brij Bhatti’s wife tells him, “Tum theek se bure bhi to nahi ho, Agar hote to hume itni pareshaani nahi hoti. Zindagi aasaan hoti, kuch bhala ho jaata.” This tries to highlight the basic issue with this series as well! It tries to be good, but does not set the standard of storytelling it should have! The honest gambler narrative, in fact, backfires in the long run! Every criminal in Indian web series nowadays is a good man at heart. The narrative sounds heroic, but it is not when you see it through a weak script!
The visual grammar of the 1960s is arguably the major drawback of this web series! The sets never take you to the 60s and 70s. The series is a gambling bet that forgot to take the risks! It’s a story about a man who redefined gambling, but the creators themselves were too afraid to gamble. Brij Bhatti is both the hero and the villain, but does not commit to either of his sides wholeheartedly, and the show ends up hanging loose somewhere between the good and the bad. Let us just call it regular, and no one likes regular stuff!
It keeps fumbling and stumbling till the very end. If you’re looking for the Nagraj Manjule who changes cinema, nothing is changing here. If you want to see Vijay Varma look cool in 60s collars while the plot meanders, then maybe, just maybe, give it a watch. But overall, this is a missed opportunity!
PS. An Imaandaar gambler but a cheating partner, does not qualify for me in any legit world!
PPS. Sai Tamhankar & Kritika Kamra both win for me in the end!
2.5 stars!
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