Monica, O My Darling: A Stylish Misfire That Fizzles Out in Complexity

Monica, O My Darling — currently available on Netflix — aims to present itself as a hatke film. For those unfamiliar with Hindi, hatke suggests a departure from the norm, indicating that it’s not your typical Bollywood fare. It’s characterized in reviews as a blend of neo-noir, dark comedy, and crime thriller, but much of that description is exaggerated. The cinematographer, Swapnil S. Sonawane, employs extravagant techniques like dolly zooms for effect, but often in contexts that feel out of place. Additionally, the background score is heavy-handed, featuring the same track — “Yeh Ek Zindagi”, reminiscent of ‘70s Bollywood dance sequences with a nod to Asha Bhosle — relentlessly played throughout, which has stuck in my mind annoyingly as I write this critique.

This feels a bit familiar to me. Vasan Bala, the director of Monica, O My Darling, emphasized style over substance in his earlier film, Mard Ko Dard Nahi Hota (known internationally as The Man Who Feels No Pain). Here, however, there’s a complete absence of substance. Despite its flashy style, upbeat tone, and a facade of coolness, Bala cannot mask the fact that Monica, O My Darling is overwhelmingly ordinary. Adapted by Andhadhun co-writer Yogesh Chandekar from the lesser-known 1989 novel Burūtasu no Shinzō by Japanese mystery writer Keigo Higashino, this Netflix feature revolves around an incessant barrage of plot twists. The numerous betrayals and schemes — one character kills another and so forth — ultimately render the story senseless by the conclusion. It flits about like a headless chicken.

Monica, O My Darling is essentially bloated and underdeveloped. It squanders the talents of its ensemble cast. Among the performances of the leading trio — Rajkummar Rao, Huma S. Qureshi, and Radhika Apte — Apte’s portrayal of a police officer stands out as the only character with any charm, while Qureshi shines in her limited role, and Rao (who has the most prominent screen presence) mostly frets and manages chaos throughout. Others in the lower billing either meet their demise within the first half hour, come across as tedious and unbearable, or exist merely to advance the plot.

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This new Indian Netflix movie primarily centers around Jayant “Johnny” Arkhedkar (Rao), a resident of a fictional small town in Maharashtra. The film frequently underscores his impoverished background, but this aspect never significantly influences the plot, making it a pointless inclusion. After attending an unspecified Indian Institute of Technology, he secures a position at the Unicorn Group’s robotics division, where he climbs the corporate ladder to become a board member. Publicly, Johnny is in a relationship with the boss’s daughter, Nikki (Akansha Ranjan Kapoor), and is poised to marry into the family. Privately, however, he is having an affair with Monica Machado (Qureshi), the boss’s secretary, who is introduced like an item number. The decisions made in Monica, O My Darling are quite peculiar.

In the early moments of Monica, O My Darling, Monica informs Johnny that she is expecting. While she is willing to raise the child alone, she also coerces him into supporting her anticipated expenses. Johnny soon discovers he’s not her sole target. Monica has been involved with other colleagues at Unicorn, including the boss’s son Nishikant “Nishi” Adhikari (Sikandar Kher), who harbors animosity towards Johnny, and the accounts manager Arvind Manivannan (Bagavathi Perumal, credited simply as Bucks) who is perpetually on edge. Nishi concludes the only way out from Monica’s financial demands is murder, and they conspire to eliminate her — one will execute the act, another will transport the remains, and the last will dispose of the body — going so far as to draft a “contract” on paper.

As anticipated from a film claiming to be a comedic crime thriller, everything unravels spectacularly, yet it is neither funny nor suspenseful — Monica, O My Darling simply wanders aimlessly. (Only a few moments during its 130-minute duration truly captured my interest.) As Unicorn employees start to fall victim to a series of deaths that make headlines, the Pune Police, led by ACP Naidu (Apte), begins to scrutinize those nearest to them. Johnny and his associates further jeopardize their fate with blunders that make them seem like amateurs, openly revealing crucial information when silence would have benefited them. Additionally, characters act unreasonably to serve the plot’s needs, or possess an invulnerability that shields them in ridiculous circumstances.

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Mild spoilers ahead. For reasons that elude me, Monica, O My Darling reveals its murder mystery right from the start, yet still expects viewers to remain engaged throughout the narrative. I questioned if this was an intentional misdirection, but after 100 minutes we learn that it was the same perpetrator all along. (The culprit also goes on to explain the events, as if it holds any significance or if we actually care at that point. A frustrating characteristic for any mystery film.) End of spoilers. The Netflix film injects additional twists in the final moments — all involved are part of a conspiracy that stretches to the very top — in an effort to keep viewers pondering after the ending credits. However, Monica, O My Darling is so entangled that I found myself preferring to disengage.

In the end, Bala’s Netflix offering is far from the humor it prescribes, lacks the cleverness it aspires to, and is nowhere near as avant-garde as it suggests. It courses along predictably, overshadowed by a near-constant background score — reminiscent of James Gunn or Taika Waititi banking on upbeat tracks to carry you through a subpar narrative. Bala seems to have fallen for this same trap. As the body count rises in Monica, O My Darling, the ensemble cast proves inconsequential, and the film spirals into chaos. At the outset of this review, I criticized the genre labels this Netflix film propagated. It convincingly misses the mark as neither thrilling nor comical, and certainly not a neo-noir. The only assertion it fulfills is the crime aspect, as I have illustrated. Yet, the gravest offense is its very production.

Monica, O My Darling became available Friday, November 11 at 1:30 PM IST on Netflix across the globe. In India, Monica, O My Darling can be viewed in Hindi, English, Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam.