Cast: Pulkit Samrat, Kriti Kharbanda, Jim Sarbh, Sanjeeda Shaikh, Abhimanyu Singh and Harshvardhan Rane

Director: Bejoy Nambiar

Rating: ***  

Platform: ZEE5

Taish is the revenge drama film/series, streaming on Zee5 as it's another original venture directed and jointly produced by Bejoy Nambiar and Nishant Pitti. The project is an archetypical Bejoy Nambiar film/series, with a great star cast, excellent soundtracks, superb concept, and exemplary cinematographic direction.

It starts off with Sunny (Pulkit Samrat) violently beating a gangster in the washroom of a pub, the scene staging the reason for the rage. Next, the audience is taken to the flashback of Rohan's (Jim Sarbh) younger brother Krish's (Ankur Rathee) weeklong wedding to his girlfriend Mahi (Zoa Morani) in 10 days, at a scenic country estate in the UK. It shows that all s going fine even when  Sunny Lalwani (Pulkit Samrat) comes to attend the wedding, the boys look at this as an opportunity to catch up and let loose - unabashed and fun revelry dotting the weeklong affair. Things are still going smoothly even though Rohan is having some turmoil in his relationship with his Pakistani girlfriend Aarfa (Kriti Kharbanda). The groom and the bride also have their own issue going on, though the wedding festivities continue to happen.


Somewhere else in the dark grimy corners of South Hall London, a violent criminal family of moneylenders is headed by Kuljinder (Abhimanyu Singh) with his two brothers Palli (Harshvardhan Rane) and Jassi (Armaan Khera). Pali has been planning to quit the family business and start life afresh with Kuljnder's wife Jahaan (Sanjeeda Sheikh) with whom he has been having an affair. But fate has other plans for him. Both the world collides when Kuljinder comes to attend the wedding in the countryside. A past dirty secret connected to Rohan and Kuljinder sparks an incident of violence which then kick starts a chain of violence changing all their lives drastically.

With the transition of each scene and the unraveling of each character, the audience is engaged with analyzing and concluding how indifferent is the skin of each protagonist or antagonist, especially the three male leads of the film - Sunny, Rohan, and Paali - are all flawed men whereas the women in their lives turn out to be collateral damage in their pursuit of soothing their anger and egos.


Overall, the star cast of the film/series has done true justice to each character, putting life in each character, and giving it its personality. What probably stood out the most was Harshvardhan Rane playing the antagonist, whether it is showing violent emotions, romance, or dialogue delivery in Punjabi, the actor did it all with utter finesse. All the other actors gave a commendable performance too, but it lagged a more meaningful and exciting plot, which was lost, and perhaps a cliff hanger at the end would have had a better effect. Bejoy Nambiar's direction is something that makes him stand out as a filmmaker, with films coming across as a package of entertainment Taish, however, has some good moments but in the end, leaves the audience a bit underwhelmed with the screenplay and its editorial.


The music was mellifluent and skilfully composed by Raghav Sachar, Prashant Pillai, Govind Vasantha, Enbee, and Gaurav Godkhindi, while lyrics were written by Rohit Sharma, Hussain Haidry, Armaan Khera, and Enbee. The classical infused notes in the background kept the mood of violence deteriorated and hemmed in with every changing temperament.

Taish is few and far between a usual revenge thriller but it is over and above, about the characters dealing with guilt and trauma in their own conflicted frame of mind. It is a series that winningly wraps in the audience in its decoy, engaging them with good performances. Though the efforts of Bejoy Nambiar and the star cast are quite evident, the series, however, does not leave a lasting impact.