Film Review: Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga [The Thief Escapes]

Starring: Yami Gautam Dhar, Sunny Kaushal, Sharad Kelkar, Indraneil Sengupta, Barun Chanda

Director: Ajay Singh

Many Bollywood fans will instantly associate the title of this new Netflix release with a catchy childhood nursery rhyme which warned against letting a thief escape the net. And, this action thriller is centred around just such a slippery thief.

Neha (Gautam Dhar) is an efficient flight attendant who is willing to go out of her way to ensure passengers on her watch are well taken care of. It is during one such flight that she meets arrogant businessman Ankit Sethi (Kaushal), who is so charmed by her foregoing her own vegan meal for him that he pleads her for dinner date on landing. Neha, a consummate professional, declines the offer but as luck or destiny would have it, the pair bump into each other at a night club in the fictional Middle Eastern city of Al-Barkat soon after.

Their love affair unfolds in flashbacks while Neha is coping with a plane hijack, which has scuppered her boyfriend Ankit’s carefully constructed mid-air diamond heist plans. As Ankit gets beaten black and blue by the masked hijackers, Neha tries to help him out with the heist while simultaneously trying to keep the passengers calm in a very dangerous scenario.

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Will the couple succeed in their plot to dupe the corrupt home minister (Chanda) and snatch his diamonds encrusted as a smartphone cover from under his very nose or will their conspiracy get exposed with disastrous consequences?

‘Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga’ has most of the ingredients that make up an engaging heist film minus a crucial one – an extremely taut script. However, Yami Gautam Dhar’s powerhouse performance lifts the rather mediocre plot into quite a watchable crime caper. While Kaushal plays the slippery charmer with natural ease, most of the other characters are relegated into the background as the film’s female lead takes full charge of a decently paced narrative.

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The twist that’s in store in the second half keeps the audience sufficiently hooked to follow the trail of that elusive diamond encrusted phone. It may not win any awards in the heist films genre, but this one still belongs on the streaming list for a lazy weekend.