Manvat Murders (Marathi) is a chilling depiction of amoral humans

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It’s the bane of life: superstition. Alongside come accompaniments like black magic, tantriks, human sacrifice and witchcraft in all its forms. Pushing this evil into dirtier depths is the incentive it gets from lack of education and the lack of natural wisdom. Add greed for Mammon and other desires and (a bestial) sky is the limit!

In 1972-1973, a series of seemingly random and senseless murders hit the Manvat district of Maharashtra, where (in all) seven pre-pubescent girls and women were brutally murdered, one of whom was beheaded. Each body was mutilated and the private organs of the girls disfigured. This was followed by the final murder of a young boy who helped in herding sheep.

As the local police were stymied, Mumbai’s top cop Ramakant Kulkarni, who later was to become Director-General of Police, was summoned to investigate at the express desire of the Home Minister. While a couple of Marathi films in the 1970s and 1980s were based on this story that shocked the nation, this version for the web is based on the book by Kulkarni himself and thus can be considered to have a good level of authenticity.

Kulkarni himself is played by actor-writer-filmmaker Ashutosh Gowariker (who, poor man, is given a hideous wig!) and with his unorthodox, non-violent style of interrogation, he unravels a shocking saga of human callousness and amoral behavior.

And yet, if it was not for a family member who craves for her daughter’s future well-being and a self-styled sorcerer also worried about his sick daughter, the truth would never have been pieced together.

The director (Ashish Avinash Bende) has made the drama very cinematic and has extracted a wonderful script from Girish Joshi. The pace could have been stepped up, but to be fair, at no point does it seem as if it is dragging, for the investigation is shown to be detailed and meticulous, and the culprits’ motivations are also clearly brought out. Involved in the whole chain of macabre events are two cops whose characters are grey, a local wannabe shaman, and a man who loves the family member who spills the final beans, among others.

The background score (Saket Kanetkar) is one of the best you will hear in a web series, and influences the atmosphere throughout. With solid talent from Marathi cinema / TV/ stage/web series, the saga rises taller because of its consummate performances.

Sonali Kulkarni (who recently dazzled in Love, Sitara in a glam role) as Rukminibai, the woman craving for motherhood, tops the list, followed by Sai Tamhankar in the de-glam role of the tribal woman Samindri. Though every performance is good, Makarand Anaspure as Sonali’s husband, Kishor Kadam as the tantrik, Mayur Khandge as Vakatkar, Umesh Jagtap as Paranje, Sagar Yadav as Ambadas and Purnanand Wandhekar as Nawathe stand out.

As for Ashutosh Gowariker, if you can focus purely on his performance and not on the aforementioned hair apparatus (!), he is very sincere and believable in his causal but sharp coolness.

The series, however, rises above all its assets in the way it depicts the immensely disturbing and not-easily-forgettable account of how people can be motivated and influenced to become inhuman, heedless of both the consequences to themselves and their families and also to the nears and dears of their victims.

Rating: ***1/2

Sony LIV presents A Storyteller’s Nook’s Manvat Murders  Produced by: Mahesh Kothare & Addinath Kothare  Directed by: Ashish Avinash Bende  Written by: Ramakant Kulkarni & Girish Joshi  Music: Saket Kanetkar  Starring: Ashutosh Gowariker, Sonali Kulkarni, Sai Tamhankar, Makarand Anaspure, Umesh Jagtap, Shardul Saraf, Ketan Karande, Sagar Yadav, Rupesh Jadhav, Kishor Kadam, Mayur Khandge, Purnanand Wandhekar, Vitthal Kale, Yashpal Sarnath & others