Rather than the shorts, this is like a 4 episodic series with all around 1 hour in duration. Before I go talk on them individually, have to mention I totally loved the stories, making me wanna go back someday and read more of Satyajit Ray stories if at all they are available somewhere for common people like me. 



Forget Me Not 
Directed by : Srijit Mukherji (Vasan Bala - check on netflix)

Tu Computer hai, tere liye jo data hai.. mere liye woh yaadein hai.. main nahi kar sakta inko delete. 

Ipsit Nair (Ali Fazal) is a famous busy robotic businessman who takes pride in his memory always remembering all the tiniest of details about everyone he has met. And its the reason why his life turns upside down when he meets a lady who seems to know him but he can't recollect their previous meeting.  That just one memory loss, effects him to an extent that his memory starts fading in every day to day routine. Best way to describe this episode would be the 1st scene, the un-necessary time that lady takes to walk for a drink. Also, the revenge angle when revealed takes away a lot from the story. Love the scenes where Ipsit is dreaming of forgetting his child at theatre food corner, or when he can't locate his car at the parking lot. Ali Fazal is again in terrific form, I just wished they either kept it totally a case of memory loss leading to mental asylum making a lovely psychological study or the revenge angle was done in a much better way. In the end it ends up as a very average episode despite the great story. 


Bahrupiya
Directed by : Srijit Mukherji 

Hum bhi bhagwaan jaise hi hai Indrashish, hum bhi shrishti karte hai.

Indrashish Shah (Kay Kay Menon), a middle class guy who feels broken due to every person he has met in this cruel world. One day he finds his late grandmother left him with a book on make-up and prosthetics and a big sum of money which is when he realizes how he can turn around his life and also take revenge from the people who didn't treat him well. But this soon turns into an obsession,, and when you feel you are a creator i.e God, the end is always near. Another story whose adaptation and broad changes lets it down for me, had it stayed around Indrashish trying to do more than what he should and realize his mistake, it would had bigger impact and probably would had sympathised with Indrashish then. Instead he is turned firstly into a sociopath and then someone who wants to challenge God too. I did however enjoy Dibyendu Bhattacharya as Peer Baba, even if I wish this character wasn't part of story. Kay Kay Menon is again excellent, the writing just lets this one down too. Still, it was more enjoyable than the 1st episode.


Hungama Hai Kyon Barpa 
Directed by : Abhishek Chaubey 

Kisi ko ghar se nikalte hi mil gayi manzil, koi hamari tarah umar bhar safar mein raha.

Musafir Ali (Manoj Bajpayee) is travelling to Delhi from Bhopal by train and ends up meeting Aslam Baig (Gajraj Rao) sharing same coach. But Musafir soon realises how he had met Aslam before too, coincidentally in train many years back and he had stolen a very precious watch then. Its easily the best episode of the whole series. Abhishek hasn't done this kind of cinema before, he has been more into dark zone.. but how wondefully he sets the narrative here and ofcourse helped with the jugalbandi of Manoj Bajpayee and Gajraj Rao, you don't even want them to stop talking, such is their range and also the use of Urdu makes it for a great watch. Musafir constantly breaks the 4th wall, plenty of dream sequences or mirrors used to narrate his flashbacks including his rise to fame. The entire previous meet of theirs happens on what is a clock setup, even the shayaris done happens with a train setup. Train journeys always makes for fun watch for how two strangers talk and find some strange bonding. But the episode does get away from the train setting finally, and its again a delight because we meet Hakim Saab (Raghuvir Yadav) and a shopkeeper (Manoj Pahwa) who are fun in their small cameos. And I enjoyed the title track a lot too. One of my fav episodes that I may come to re-watch again in future, no complaints at all with a very fun ending and also learnt the stealing habit has a name called Kleptomania!


Spotlight 
Directed by : Vasan Bala

Tu yeh jo sochta hai na ki Ryan Gosling meets Elon Musk wala jo look tu achieve karega, tu nahi kar sakta.

When Vik (Harshvardhan Kapoor) arrives at a luxurious hotel for a mahurat shot of his film, he insists on getting the room where Madonna stayed. But he is shocked to learn that the room has been taken away from him because Didi (Radhika Madan), a godwoman demands the same room for same reason. The spotlight slowly keeps shifting away from Vik, and that gets him so mad. This one totally didn't work for me, and reason is straightforward, I didn't like the vision of director and where he tried to take the story with a very ridiculous ending. Its the supporting act of Roby Ghosh (Chandan Roy Sanyal) that I enjoyed the most, specially when he tells Vik he will never get the look of Ryan Gosling meets Ekon Musk, or when he tells Vik to be cool and accept the fact that people are more mad for religion than the celebrities. Also, like the scene involving Vik and Didi that comes just before the climax. I still didn't get what difference Vik's various 'Look' shoots had, I mean the final one that he nails as per everyone, was totally ditto to what he had been doing before, or was it some sort of sarcasm that I didn't pick up. Aneways, its good to see Harshvardhan go even deeper in a role that very much makes fun of him (like the small role in AK vs AK). I wish the dynamics of worshipping celebrities vs worshipping godwoman was explored deeply and in a different manner, an opportunity lost. 


So, Ray has a clear winner in form of 'Hungama Kyon Hai Bharpa', while 'Behrupiya' works in parts, 'Forget me Not' had potential but misses mark while 'Spotlight' was a total miss. 


My Rating : 5/10