Taapsee Pannu and Ishwak Singh do their jobs well, but the writing and direction do not give them enough to work with in this action thriller that never really thrills.
Taapsee Pannu plays Bani, a mother whose daughter is abducted. After losing her eyesight in the aftermath, she refuses to give up and sets out to find her child, taking on a dangerous world of crime and trafficking.
Taapsee Pannu acts well and does exactly what the role demands, but unfortunately, that doesn't save the day. Ishwak Singh too puts in a good performance, while the supporting cast does its part. The problem lies largely with Kanika Dhillon's writing and Devashish Makhija's direction.
Gandhari is supposed to be an action thriller, but it is an action thriller without any real thrills. There are no genuine edge-of-the-seat moments, and the film rarely creates the kind of tension or urgency you expect from this genre. You keep waiting for the story to grip you, but it never quite gets there.
Technically, the film looks good. The cinematography is effective, the art direction and costumes are impressive, and there is clearly effort in creating the world of the film. But good production design alone cannot create suspense. The film struggles to build momentum, and the emotional stakes never translate into the urgency the story needs.
The idea of taking inspiration from Gandhari from the Mahabharata is interesting. There is a potentially powerful thought at the heart of it, a woman who chose to be blindfolded. But ultimately, that feels like a one-line idea rather than something the film successfully develops into an engaging story.
If you have a Netflix subscription, chances are you will eventually watch Gandhari. But having access to it cannot be the reason to click on a title, especially when Netflix itself has so much better content sitting right there.
Taapsee and Ishwak do their jobs well, but the writing and direction don't give them enough to work with. Gandhari is an action thriller that never really thrills. Gandhari is out on Netflix. I give it two out of five.