Costao
Introduction
The opening sequence of the new Hindi film Costao is actually a voice-over of a little girl who compares her father with pure gold. This remained one of the huge creative mistakes of the film – one, because voiceovers account for woefully lazy filmmaking wherein the emotions are ‘conveyed’ as opposed to ‘communicated’, and two, because it completely diluted the character of the protagonist Costao Fernandes (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) who played the honest customs officer framed for the murder of a smuggler working for a politician. The broader-strokes here include an ‘Us Versus Theme’ narrative that essentially would work well for biopics of more famous ‘historical’ personalities (like last week’s Phule), simply because the core conflict remains strong enough for your sympathies to sway towards the protagonist (whom we have already read about previously). But if the biopic revolves around a relatively unknown entity, the same narrative becomes one-track and all vanilla. Ideally, what the biopic needed here was an additional ‘internal’ conflict with respect to the character of Costao, something that is more internal rather than the external conflict that is created around him. That would have not only added complexity but also a deep emotional core to resonate with the character. And that for me will go down as a huge demerit for the film.
Story & Screenplay
One prime example of the ‘Us Versus Them’ narrative in recent times is that of Joy Deb (Manoj Bajpayee) in the Hindi film Despatch (2024). It may not be the purest example of the genre but the same rules would apply here. At any given point in Despatch, the character was either running behind unraveling the truth or later running away to save his life. This remained a bimary conflict in many ways. But Joy wasn’t a saint either – he had marital problems, was a perennial liar, and also having his morality skewed by having affairs with multiple women around him (despite being committed). This added an additional layer of complexity to his character wherein you always remain conflicted on whether you should support him and his ideologies in the wake of broader strokes of morality, or hold him accountable for the mess created in his personal life. That flavour for me was missing in Costao. In a scene during a discreet dinner date with his wife Mariya (Priya Bapat), you see Costao distracted by the presence of a smuggler Peter (Hussain Dalal) who wants to strike a deal with him, in exchange of giving him a free pass for his ‘goods’. That little scene did tell me that Costao was a flawed individual with respect to his family, often giving his work more priority at any given moment. And while Mariya remains recluse, she quickly forgives Costao for the same, almost being normal with him in the very next scene. You see – the idea of a conflict within a conflict wasn’t there!
Set in the 90s, Goa, the broader strokes in the drama work decently upto a point – you see a potential tip-off resulting in a string of heavy-duty scenes involving Costao who wishes to keep surveillance during the night. This is followed up by an expose, a chase sequence, a death, and the protagonist fleeing from the crime spot, all in a matter of minutes and across a few scenes. The threat looming with respect to a politician D’Mello (Kishor Kumar G) felt palpable to begin with, given his fetish to beat a man to pulp just on a hunch of him being an informer. On the other hand, Costao, a former athlete himself who equates his job to be that of a goalkeeper in football, suddenly finds himself in the middle of a pickle after accidently committing a murder, only to be abandoned by his own department and being a target of a revenge-thirsty politician who wishes to get even.
A string of incidents connect this sentiment – he is attacked at a local hospital; the widow of the slain character attacks him outside the court; the court itself upholds the accusations agaimst him; he has to move out of his family to a customs quarter while the relationship with his wife and children sours over time. Costao can no longer attend the sport day at his children’s school even as his wife asks him for how long does he plan to go on, before giving everything up for his family. In fact, even his daughter sees him getting beaten up, a plot-point that in-turn nullifies the personality of the protagonist given the use of her voiceover. It almost felt like the film unfolding through his daughter’s gaze that significantly diluted the drama. The price that he plays for his heroics is evident, but I was hardly moved given the predictability of the drama.
The proceedings here are understated but that isn’t an excuse to barter for the urgency in the drama. And by urgency, I don’t necessarily mean a faster narrative but more in the urgency for emotions that were brimming beneath the surface, without fully being utilized. After a point, the character of D’Mello also felt less threatening, although a glimmer of hope lay with respect to the character of Narang (Gagan Dev Riar), a CBI official who continues to pose as a challenge through his aggressive questioning as instructed by D’Mello and the higher officials (thereby briefly replacing D’Mello). But this is also wherein the familiar trope of a biopic sets in – the timejump takes places with a change in the setting, just doing enough to create an illusion of ‘delayed justice’. There was an interesting (late) sub-plot threatening to get the drama on track but it somehow was adandoned in the turn of events leading to a final act that didn’t have a similar punch to boast of. And that summed up the screenplay that was umderstated alright but didn’t exactly delve into the complexities of its protagonist. Costao was a green flag, and that is exactly where the problem was.
Dialogues, Music & Direction
The dialogues are adequate but some comparisons (like Costao equating himself to be a goalkeeper) seem gimmicky while breaking the grammer of realism. The music and BGM mildly add a flavour of the Goan setting but largely, they remains mid while never quite elevating the drama at any particular juncture. The cinematography remains basic with frames that effectively seem pale, even while not being colour corrected properly. I understand the era being that of the 90s, but it didn’t necessarily reflect in the frames that often also struggle with low lightening. The character of the setting also didn’t quite come through with regards to the framing, that seldom wished to shift POVs from its protagonist. The editing is a little choppy but more importantly, the angst and pain of the protagonist is necessarily carried out from one scene to another, which remained a demerit. Director Sejal Shah doesn’t quite land with the treatment that she has to offer. She isn’t able to lift the drama behind the writing flaw with respect to the characterization of the protagonist that needed to be ‘flawed’ for a better impact. The direction remains mid at best even with the staging of a few scenes that literally feel ‘staged’ rather than working well in the context of the drama. The filmmaking needed more byte to have a greater impact on the proceedings.
Performances
The performances are pretty good although not all characters have a proper arc, or alternately suffer from a layered sense of characterization. Gagan Dev Riar as Narang is absolutely phenomenal, and he is able to hold your attention simply through his presence. Mahika Sharma as Cassandra is terrific too, making good use of her expressions to showcase the pain and angst of her character. Rohiit Tiwari as Naik is sincere and earnest, while playing the perfect foil to the protagonist. Hussain Dalal as Peter is pretty solid and has his moments to shine. Kishor Kumar G as D’Mello is mildly intimidating but his performance doesn’t fully bloom due to a woefully underwritten character. Priya Bapat as Maria is first rate, and her confrontations with Costao remain some of the best scenes of the film. Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Costao also manages to impress although I wasn’t fully convinced about the character’s Goan roots that would mildly be evident through the accent. Nevertheless, Nawaz does try and bring a range of emotions to the table only to be cheated upon by his characterization that only offered him a scope for broad-strokes. The intrinsic conflict was the missing link of the puzzle, that restricted the character growth. But despite that, Nawaz ensures that the proceedings are atleast watchable.
Conclusion
Despite good performances, Costao remains an insipid biopic that suffers from the ‘Green Flag Syndrome’. The characterization offered of the protagonist is so broad-stroked that it almost feels half-empty after a point, thereby making the drama an average watch at best. Available on Zee5.
