Delhi Talkies’ Moh Maya Money (UA) is the story of a middle-class couple living in Delhi, and their greed.
Aman (Ranvir Shorey) and Divya (Neha Dhupia) are a married couple leading a middle-class life in Delhi. Aman works for a real estate company while Divya works in a media company. Aman is fed up of being middle-class and wants to become rich and live in luxury. He, therefore, often cheats his company to make quick money. In one such deal, he borrows money from Raghuveer (Devendra Chowhan) and invests that money to book a plot of land to build a home for himself and wife Divya. But his boss (Sandeep Narula) gets to know of Aman cheating the company and he sacks him from the job.
While Aman shows Divya the plot of land he has booked, he does not reveal anything about the loss of job to her. When Raghuveer asks Aman to return his money, Aman is in a fix. Raghuveer threatens Aman and even has him beaten up by his goons when he doesn’t return the money on the promised date.
Aman tries to borrow money against his life insurance policy but the insurance company refuses. It is then that Aman decides to fake his death so that his wife could claim money from the life insurance company. Divya is against the plan but finally gets sucked into it when he carries it out. While himself escaping in a stage-managed car accident, Aman ensures that the police find a charred body in his car. Divya identifies the burnt body as Aman’s.
Even as Divya is awaiting the cheque from the insurance company, she is shocked to learn of something horrifying from the police station. Meanwhile, Divya herself has done things which shock Aman. What are the horrifying facts which Divya gets to know due to her visit to the police station to collect the proofs of Aman’s ‘death’ in the accident? What are the actions of Divya, which shock Aman?
Munish Bhardwaj has written a story which has plenty of turns and twists and which is pretty intriguing. The story is so engrossing that the audience remains engaged in it right from the start till the end. The screenplay, written by Munish Bhardwaj and Mansi Nirmal Jain, is entertaining and engaging. It moves at a fast pace and doesn’t give time to the viewers to think. Yes, there are a couple of weak links like Aman objecting to Divya’s abortion, calling it the murder of his unborn child, which looks silly as he himself is guilty of another murder. Likewise, Divya is ready to walk out on Aman because he had not told her about being sacked from his job. But it later turns out that Divya herself has hidden a lot from Aman. Why later, even around the same time as Aman losing his job, Divya is shown to be preparing to go to Hong Kong for official work, without taking Aman into confidence. However, despite these lapses, the screenplay is well-written and very fast-moving. Dialogues, penned by Munish Bhardwaj and Mansi Nirmal Jain, with additional dialogues by Ranvir Shorey, are realistic and effective.
Ranvir Shorey lives the role of the unscrupulous Aman who can go to any lengths to make fast money. He makes the character very believable by his natural acting. Neha Dhupia is also excellent as Divya. She plays the scheming wife with such finesse that you marvel at her ease in front of the camera. Vidushi Mehra lends very good support as Bhavana whom Divya meets and befriends at the police station. Ashwath Bhat makes his presence felt as Divya’s colleague, Kabir. Devendra Chowhan leaves a mark as Raghuveer. Anant Raina is good as upcoming film director Rohan. Sandeep Nirula (as Aman’s boss), Priya Tandon (as Jiya), Sagar Jha and Pramod Kumar (both as Raghuveer’s goons) and Bittoo Ishwar Chhabra (as the cop at Kasauli) provide excellent support. Prateek Asnani (as Roy), Haneef Menon (as the accountant), Vaani Pahwa (as the doctor) and Srikant Verma (as the Delhi cop) are adequate. Others do as desired.
Munish Bhardwaj’s direction is very nice. His narration affords no time or gives no reason to the audiences to think or even let their thoughts wander. Harpreet Singh’s music and Varun Grover’s lyrics are appropriate. Tuomas Kantelinen’s background music is nice. Arun Varma’s camerawork is good. Shoumini Ghosh Roy and Dhruv Satija’s art direction is effective. Editing (Hitesh Kumar) is crisp.
On the whole, Moh Maya Money is a well-made and an interesting film which boasts of lovely performances. It would still not fetch returns because of lack of promotion and, therefore, a very dull start.