I am glad I got a chance to watch “Hubba”, Bratya Basu’s latest and fifth film on the big screen before it shifted to OTT platforms. The drone videography over vast stretches of the Ganges and Calcutta, which is where the tale takes off, can only really be properly experienced on a wide platform. The swoop down from skies above to the river and city below can only be felt in all its horror when the viewer has a bird’s eye view. And this bird’s eye view is that of a predatory bird zeroing in on its prey down below.

Basu’s story, after all, is about predators and their prey and how tenuous the lines are between the two and how blurry. As the camera zooms in, the view of the river becomes clearer – it is that of a sooty city canal, the banks of which are crammed with congested slums. “We have grown up drinking the dirty waters of this filthy river,” says the voiceover in Bengali. It is that of the protagonist Hubba Bimal. Based on the life and times of Shyamal Das, a notorious gangster, known as “Hubba” and also “Dawood Ibrahim” of Howrah and Hooghly, who thrived during the 1980s and was in the police’s “most wanted” list for crimes, ranging from extortion to murder to robbery and theft, Bratya’s “Hubba” fictionalises characters with changed names and timeframes.

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He ropes in one of Bangladesh’s best, Mosharraf Karim, to play Hubba and it’s a power packed performance down to the last diabolic detail – the twitch of the eyelids as he drives a knife into the stomach of his victim; the quiver of the lips twisted into a smile as he celebrates a successful robbery; the rolling of the eyeballs as he concocts outrageous lies while being thrashed and interrogated by police. Actor Indraneil Sengupa as the investigating officer delivers another stellar performance with nuanced expressions of a complex character, revealed with each changing role – cop, husband, father, secret lover, uncaring son, callous brother, ruthless upholder of law.

The film is mounted on a large canvas, which while focusing on the epicentre – Hubba’s haunts in the seedy underbelly of Calcutta – still sends off tremors to adjoining areas. This is true not just of the physical settings – from the dingy alleys of ghettos the action moves to shiny havelis bought with raw cash, for instance – but of the psychological spaces too.

Basu’s Bimal is not diagnosed obviously but he fits the description of the psychopath to the T and there is no remorse as he goes on a killing spree. The lack of morality is not contained within the limits of Hubba’s inner psyche. It spreads to the entire self-serving society which feeds off him. The unscrupulous politician trying to prevent a rival from contesting and hires his services for intimidating his opponent’s family in exchange for political protection. The corrupt cop who knows all the routes of the thugs’ red herrings and refuses to squeal for a cut of the extortion income. Etc.

Cruel to parents, teachers, elders, in-laws and others, the conscienceless Hubba nevertheless “falls in love” and marries. Not once but twice. “We don’t disrespect girls and women,” he says while his gang members threaten the wife and daughter of his political protector’s rival. He and his gang issues suggestive caveats but there is the element of an absurd, perverted, illusory idea that they represent friends-of-the-poor-who-do-no-wrong.

Basu’s film’s biggest strength is the skillful juxtaposition of realities. The merging of middle class values with underworld compulsions. And the resultant and periodical interjection of “shock” factors which follow. The way Hubba, as a schoolboy chucks ink at his teacher during an exam when caught cheating and runs out of the schoolroom. The way he slaps and hits his own father. The way he describes his feelings after spilling others’ blood. “There is no kick like the feel of warm blood hitting the face after a cold murder,” he chuckles as even his hardcore comrades in crime stare in utter disbelief. The dialogue is laced with humour and laden with raw Bengali slang.

Much is expected from a Bratya Basu film. An award-winning playwright, director and actor, he has been a seasoned thespian before he became a politician, joining Mamata Banerjee’s movement before her political party Trinamool came to power in Bengal in 2011. Indeed what lends a lot of credibility to this film is his firsthand understanding of the world of politics. As an MLA and minister who has not lost an election since his party swept thirteen years ago, he has the insights of someone in the unique position of not just having an insider’s grip on the subject of his film but as a longtime thespian, the dexterity with which to execute it.

Actually, “Hubba” surpasses expectations.