Mufti (film)

''Mufti'' () is a 2017 Indian Kannada-language neo-noir action thriller film directed by Narthan, making his debut, and produced by Jayanna Combines. The film tells the story of a police officer, played by Sriimurali, who tracks down and confronts an underworld boss, played by Shiva Rajkumar.

Production started in July 2016, and the film was released on 1 December 2017. The film received positive response from critics. The film was declared blockbuster at the box office and was one of the highest-grossing movies in Shivarajkumar's career. The film is being remade in Tamil as '' Pathu Thala'' starring Silambarasan and Gautham Karthik.

Plot

Gana is a undercover cop who disguise himself as an assassin works at the ''Mangalore Port'' area crime syndicate for 2 years and assigned to work for Bhairathi Ranagal in Ronapura, Gana arrives at Ronapura under the commissioner's orders that his identity should not be known to anyone. Gana arrives in Ronapura where he is received by Vishnu and meets Kashi, who heads a cement company of Bhairathi Ranagal.

Gurukanth Bhandri is selected for the Chief Ministerial Candidate in Karnataka and is targeting Ronapura for the elections, but their party member MP Ekanath Nimbalkar has died in the accident planned by Bhairathi, due to which Raghuveer Bhandri, Gurukanth's brother meets social worker and environmentalist Ashwath Gunari to be the new the candidate for the party, but Gunari refuses. Gana earns Bhairathi's left-hand man Singa and right-hand man Shabari's trust by helping the gang remove the stock black money from a goods train and is further asked by Shabari and Singa for the operations, while also earning Kashi's jealousy towards Gana. Ashwath Gunari holds a rally against Bhairathi for polluting the environment due to his mining operations. Bhairathi orchestrates a riot at the village and burns the houses of those persons who are supporting Gunari's rally, due to this Gunari joins Raghuveer Bhandari's campaign.

Meanwhile, Kashi brings the police officer (who happens to be the cop who helped Gana's undercover operation and also doesn't know Gana's identity), who leaked the information of unaccounted money on a goods train and tells Gana to shoot him, Gana reluctantly shoots him and feels guilty about the incident, which makes him determined to arrest Bhairathi. The next day, Bhairathi arrives at the mining where Nimbalkar's killers are caught, which is revealed that Bhairathi did not kill Nimbalkar. Gana saves Bhairathi from a temple attack orchestrated by Pashupathi, who is running for MP nomination in elections. Bhairathi attacks Pashupathi and warns him of dire consequences. Bhairathi invites Gana to his house for dinner where he meets Bhairathi's sister Vedhavathi and daughter Avni.

While Bhairathi goes for a stroll at 4:00AM, Gana sneaks into Bhairathi's house and collects various bank account numbers in a book named '' Sri Ramayana Darshanam'' and escapes minutes before Bhairathi arrives and reaches his hideout to find Kashi, having deduced his identity and calls Singa in front of Gana to inform him about Gana's identity, but the call gets cut due to DCR. Singa calls Gana and tells him to finish Kashi, Gana kills Kashi and his men where Kashi reveals that he created evidence that Kashi is in cahoots with Pashupathi to kill Bhairathi. Gana kills Kashi and checks the account transfer, only to find that the money was transferred to orphanages, old-age homes and Public schools.

Gana realizes about Bhairathi's good heartedness to help the people, when he constructed houses for the villagers' welfare and the villagers revere Bhairathi as their saviour. Vedhavathi berates Bhairathi for killing Avni's father (Vedhavathi's husband). Bhairathi is accused of the attacking Gunari, but Bhairathi catches the culprit, who happens to be Bhairathi's driver. The driver is killed and Bhairathi giftes Gunari with plants and flowers as compensation and ask him to stand independently in the elections. It is revealed that Raghuveer Bhandari is the mastermind behind the attacks. While heading for the election office. The car, in which Bhairathi and Gana are travelling, explodes killing them. Raghuveer Bhandari bribed Shabari to kill Bhairathi, in return for nominating him in the Ronapura Constituency elections.

When Shabari reaches the office, Bhairathi and Gana, who survived the attack confronts Shabari where Gana gives Shabari's watch to Shabari as he noticed Bhairathi wearing Shabari's watch and deducing his trap. Bhairathi kills Shabari and hangs him at the lamp post near Raghuveer's house and warns him not to interfere. Vedhavathi listens to the conversation of Singa and Gana where she finds that her husband was involved in medical scam, which killed millions of villagers due to which Bhairathi had killed him. Gana reunites Vedhavathi and Bhairathi on the former's birthday by clearing the misunderstanding. Gana meets Bhairathi and Bhairathi tells that he is indebted to Gana where Gana learns about Bhairathi's dark past and hatred towards the Government.

After this, Gana leaves Ronapura with the evidence as directed by the Commissioner. While heading to Commissioner's office, Gana is knocked by Raghuveer Bhandari in a car accident. Bhairathi leaves for his father's grave all alone until Raghuveer Bhandri arrives with his henchmen intending to kill him. Gana arrives at the venue, having survived the attack and battles with Raghuveer's henchmen, who is also joined by Bhairathi where the two finish the henchmen and kill Raghuveer Bhandari by slashing his throat. Upon seeing Gana's integrity, Bhairathi surrenders himself to the police and finds the portrait, which he showed it to Avni as a gift from Gana. Gana is appointed as ACP and joins the office where he finds the ''Sri Ramayana Darshanam'' book where he learns that Bhairathi knew that Gana was an undercover officer all along, where Bhairathi is also reading the book's copy in the prison.

Cast

* Shiva Rajkumar as Bhairathi Ranagal, a gang boss
* Sriimurali as Gana, an undercover police officer
* Shanvi Srivastava as Raksha, Gana's girlfriend
* Chaya Singh as Vedhavathi, sister of Bhairathi Ranagal
* Madhu Guruswamy as Singa, a member of Bhairathi Ranagal's gang
* Vasishta N. Simha as Kashi, a member of Bhairathi Ranagal's gang
* Babu Hirannaiah as Shabari, Bhairathi Ranagal's right-hand man
* Devaraj as Raghuveer Bhandari, a corrupt politician
* Sadhu Kokila as Ad Hero
* Prakash Belawadi as Environmentalist Ashwath Gunari
* Chikkanna as James Jackson, Ad director
* Bala Rajwadi
* Raj Surya as Ronnie
*Shekhar Rao
*Bus Kumar
*Manjunath Hegde
* Vinay Krishnaswamy

Soundtrack

Ravi Basrur composed two original tracks for the film and scored its background music. He previously worked with Narthan on ''Ugramm'' and '' Rathavara''.

Original tracklist

Reception

Sunayana Suresh of ''The Times of India'' gave 3.5 out of 5 and wrote "This is definitely one of the more interesting narratives that have been told on Sandalwood screen this year and it is worth that visit to the halls if intriguing and innovative commercial dramas are what you like."

Accolades

Remake

The film will be remade in Tamil starring Silambarasan and Gautham Karthik.

The producers of the remake, Studio Green, announced that their Production No 20 would be titled ''Pathu Thala''. The title was revealed on social media by ten directors — Venkat Prabhu, Pa Ranjith, Vijay Milton, Anand Shankar, Rajesh, Vignesh Shivan, Karthik Subbaraj, Ashwath Marimuthu, Santhosh P Jayakumar and Sam Anton.

Obeli N Krishna, the director of Studio Green's maiden production, '' Sillunu Oru Kadhal'', is set to helm the remake.

References

External links

* {{IMDb title, 6405208

2017 films
2010s Kannada-language films
Indian action thriller films
2017 action thriller films
Fictional portrayals of the Karnataka Police
Films about organised crime in India
Films based on Indian folklore
Indian nonlinear narrative films
Indian gangster films
2010s police procedural films
Indian crime action films
2017 crime action films
Kannada films remade in other languages
2017 directorial debut films