Criminal Justice
Criminal Justice, a Hindi series aired on Hotstar. It is adapted from a British series under the same title. The series is over ten 45-minute episodes. It inexplicably retains the broody pace of the story without quite internalizing the reason to do so.
The beauty of this series is that it has been aired for British, American and Indian audiences. The plot doesn’t change a bit. This might raise one basic question, “Do the three have the same plot?? What are the differences in these same plots?”
Yes, they are different in their culture and habits. This makes a slight change in each of the Plot. America aired this series under the title, “The Night Of.” The writers of that particular series created the protagonist as Pakistani American, Riz Ahmed. This series was aired in 2016. The original series, “Criminal Justice” is a British television drama. It was aired in 2008. Another Criminal Justice, aired in Hotstar Special(2019). The protagonist of this series is Aditya Sharma.
- 2008 Criminal Justice, the key difference is Ben, a white man accused of killing a black woman.
- 2016, ‘The Night Of’ Riz, a Muslim American accused of killing a white woman.
- 2019 Criminal Justice, Adi, a middle-class family killing an upper-class woman. That change affects the way both shows are structured: The culture clash, racial tensions, and class clash ( happens more in India).
Criminal Justice – 2019
Aditya Sharma (Vikrant Massey) wakes up from an edgy one-night stand with a hangover. He has very little memory of the late evening. His hand has a few marks of blood. But he has killed the girl he picked up in his dad’s cab. The rest of the story logically and often illogically moves the coin to prove whether Aditya is Guilty or not.
The courtroom drama is a special kind of genre in a series. This genre has a capacity of increasing interest in the audience’s mind. They make the audience convinced by expressing the early findings are perfectly right. But they end up reinvesting all the loops. Later run back to the beginning scene for decoding them in a different perspective.
Why I liked Criminal Justice aired in 2019
Huge applause to the screenwriter, Shridhar Raghavan. He has adapted the series which has been aired to British and American audiences to the Indian audience without introducing any foreign element into the series. The writing starts out distractingly and excruciatingly slow, picks up pace after three episodes. It frisks unforeseeable circumstances to juice out the best (both, from its socio-political narrative and the characters), but eventually delivers, much to the respite of its audience and, as an extension, the general public as well.
As said earlier, all these three series, Criminal Justice (2008, BBC), The Night Of (2016, American) and Criminal Justice (2019, Indian) are having the same plot. The script is multilayered, the writer, Shridhar Raghavan convincingly incorporated a lot of themes to lit the fire in the bottom mystery thriller. The ‘middle class’ boy, Aditya Sharma gets into a crime. The middle-class emotions like money, prestige and innocence provide the base setting of the series.
Characters
The exceptional performance by Jackie Shroff in the Jail is amazing. The money game inside the Jail premises often looks like a life lesson. “Who’s King or Pawn”?, drugs and life gamble are important strings in the series which happens inside Jail. These strings are properly pulled and held together.
Humour is important to everything we watch on a screen. Looking for humour in a mystery thriller is not good. But that track has done a tremendous role in uplifting the slow pace of the series. The message in the series is deep. The messages or the crux of the whole plot is open only in the final episodes. The crucifixion statue while dropping the girl becomes a symbol. Adi is getting crucified in the case. Jesus was crucified for something which he has not done. Similar to that Adi is facing his jail punishment even though he didn’t commit the crime.
Though all these three series carries the same plot, they were conveyed in a different way. I can quote a simple example, the Judicial system in America is different, it’s not like India. They have a jury bench where 13 or more people will be part to judge the case.
The performances in each series are fantastic. Try watching any two in order to know how the same is handled in two different states.
Criminal Justice (2008) available on Youtube.
The Night Of (2016) available on Hotstar.
Criminal Justice (2019) available on Hotstar.
Directed by Tigmanshu Dhulia and Vishal Furia
Cast: Pankaj Tripathi, Vikrant Massey, Jackie Shroff, Anupriya Goenka, and Mita Vashisht.
