Toothpari brings a refreshing romance in an original yet imperfect supernatural world
Intriguing but scattered in its narrative, Toothpari brings a refreshing lead pair in a story true to its Kolkata setting and millennial spirit.
Starring: Shantanu Maheshwari, Tanya Maniktala, Adil Hussain, Revathy, Tillotama Shome, Saswata Chatterjee, Sikander Kher, Anjan Dutt, and Anindita Bose.
A romance set between creatures of the netherworld and a likeable human sets a good premise for a romantic thriller. Pratim Dasgupta’s Toothpari attempts to create a world set in this intriguing zone.
It has its moments and features, refreshing leads in a story with adequate surprises around the corner. However, its visual execution and scattered narrative dilute the potential elevation for Toothpari to be an immersive and gripping watch.
Toothpari is about a gorgeous vampire Rumi (Tanya Maniktala) who breaks (under)ground rules to savour fresh human blood. There are rules of bloody engagement and a coterie of fellow vampires that back her rebellion.
Tillotama Shome as Meera, a Kathak-trained courtesan, and Saswata Chatterjee are senior vampires who have lived through the pages of India’s history. They help Rumi even as they share tales of living among humans, partaking in fresh blood instead of living buried underground, safe from sunlight and human scrutiny, but deprived of hunting.
They have a safe keeper of sorts—a human named AD (Adil Hussain)—providing them with fresh blood supply for ulterior motives. And a super vampire guru, dreadlocks and prosthetic cheek laden, who stays in hibernation, but turns up when the vampires face danger—from exposure and a secret collective of senior citizens led by a hunt-crazed witch Luna Luca (Revathy).
Things take a romantic turn when Rumi needs to see a dentist and finds the mild-mannered Roy (Shantanu Maheshwari). In the mix is a police officer (Sikander Kher), mocked for his father’s obsession with vampires in the past.
Dasgupta has imagined a world rooted in the back alleys and dimly lit yet colourful bylanes of Kolkata—reminiscent of postmodern Bengali literature. To the writer, Toothpari brought back memories of Amitav Ghosh’s Calcutta Chromosome—set in an entirely different world but imbued with ubiquitous colours, tones, and flavours of India’s oldest metropolis.
The interplay of characters is this story’s most endearing element. Maheshwari and Maniktala are effortless together, exuding natural chemistry. Also, it is original in creating a vampire story within India’s contemporary landscape, blending in with its cinematography (Subhankar Bhar) that captures Kolkata as it is—dimly lit, fluctuating voltage, and sprawling, somewhat shabby old homes.
Having said that, the story fails to keep its grip on the viewer by populating its proceedings with too many elements and multiple characters with limited agency.
Shome is underused and Hussain is confusingly over the top. Revathy plays her manipulative and cruel witch-like part effectively, but the character comes across as a random insert. Perhaps, these characters, like that of Revathy, are intended to be caricatures, but that doesn’t work.
Layered with a smooth, non-intrusive background score and fair editing, Toothpari leaves one with an afterthought that a bigger budget and scale would have done greater justice to this impossible love story.
It also reminds one that the vampire concept is not organic in Indian folklore or mythology, making some of the story almost an imposed fit in an Indian context.
There’s a fair amount of Hinglish dialogues in sync with millennial/gen Z audiences—the key to the fantasy sub-genre—and also indicative of the imported nature of the vampire story.
Having said that, Toothpari is a breezy watch with thriller tropes. It is an attempt at originality, and it features a refreshing romantic pair on screen after a while. Recommended for weekend viewing, and then make up your mind on the bingeing.
Rating: 3/5
(This review is based on a preview of the first three episodes.)
Edited by Suman Singh