Exit 5 Productions’ The Tenant (English-Hindi; A) is the story of Meera alias Soniya (Shamita Shetty) who comes as a tenant in a housing society and disturbs the peace of the people there due to her scandalous past.
Meera, also known as Soniya (Shamita Shetty), comes to a housing society as a tenant in a flat. At first, she scandalises people because of her smoking habit. Bharat (Rudhraksh Jaiswal), a young school-going boy, derives voyeuristic pleasure in watching her with a pair of binoculars as do the lecherous men in the society. Soon, Bharat befriends Meera who starts trusting him. By the by, Bharat betrays Meera’s trust. The betrayal has such serious repercussions that Meera is asked to leave the society because of an old obscene video featuring her. What is Meera’s stance? Do Meera and Bharat patch up their differences?
Sushrut Jain has written a fairly interesting story and screenplay. However, the drama seems to have been stretched too much as it moves on a single track (of Meera and the members of the society). The first half, especially, gets repetitive and moves at a leisurely pace. Things move faster after interval and even otherwise, the second half is better. Having said that, it must be added that the story-line is so thin that the overall impact of the drama is not much. The simple climax does not give the audience the high they expect. Sushrut Jain’s dialogues are quite natural.
Shamita Shetty does a fairly good job as Meera/Soniya. Rudhraksh Jaiswal is pretty impressive in the role of Bharat. Swanand Kirkire is supremely natural as Mr. Mishra. Sheeba Chadha has her moments as Mrs. Mishra. Atul Srivastava shines as Bharat’s dad. Divya Jagdale lends very fine support as Bharat’s mother. Manish Anand makes his presence felt as Meera’s boyfriend, Ajay. Harsh Mayar is wonderful as Rocky. Akshat Singh performs beautifully as Pappu. Chittaranjan Tripathy leaves a fine mark as Mr. Gupta. Sanyogita Sharma is nice as Mrs. Gupta. Jayesh V. Kardak (as Rajoo), Aniruddha Mahale (as Rohan), Manoj Shah (as Mr. Khan), Vasuki (as Natasha), Gracy Goswami (as Bharat’s classmate Aparna), Pramod Pathak (as Mr. Saxena), Lucky Sharma (as Anand), Divy Mahnot (as Tinoo), Het Thakkar (as Sachin), Nalneesh Neel (as Kamble), Dayanand Shetty (as detective Daya), Bikramjeet Kanwarpal (as the school sergeant) and the others provide decent support.
Sushrut Jain’s direction is quite nice notwithstanding the fact that the film is unidimensional. Norman Kim and Daniel Walter’s background music is alright. Cinematography (by Pankaj Kumar and Nuthan Nagaraj) is effective. Saloni Dhatrak’s production designing is appropriate. John Alan Thompson’s editing is quite sharp.
On the whole, The Tenant does not have enough commercial prospects to make any mark at the ticket windows. Lack of saleable names in the star cast, and poor promotion will add to its tale of woes.
Released on 10-2-’23 at Metro Inox (daily 1 show) and other cinemas of Bombay thru Runaway-Luminosity Distribution. Publicity & opening: poor. …….Also released all over. Opening was weak everywhere.