Pooja, Sir review: A strong premise that falls short of depth as it unfolds further

MAMI Mumbai Film Festival: Pooja, Sir highlights the socio-political climate in Nepal through the lens of a queer police officer but the story fails to connect with the audience.

Pooja, Sir review: Inspired by true events, Deepak Rauniyar’s Pooja, Sir is based on the backdrop of political unrest in Nepal. It starts as a political film but also turns out to be a kidnapping thriller. But in the middle of it all is Pooja, the detective in this case who is in a race against time to find the two young boys who were kidnapped and to find her way through all the protests happening in her country.

Out of the two boys who were kidnapped, one of them is the son of an influential couple in Nepal and hence Pooja had to come all the way from Kathmandu to solve the case. Pooja might be a person of few words but she for sure makes an impression on you. In the first frame of the film itself, you see her binding her chest with tape. She lives with her girlfriend and her father and the dynamics in their house are one of a married couple. She is the sole breadwinner while her girlfriend takes care of the household. She prefers to be addressed as ‘sir’ by her colleagues and also be given the same respect a man would’ve gotten in a workplace. She is courageous and fierce when she has to be, but she is also empathetic towards her team. Seeing her break so many stereotypical barriers is the highlight of the film. 

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But when it comes to the story, it becomes difficult to connect to any one thing as the film is constantly shifting genres. It does not have the kind of thrill you expect from a kidnapping story, nor does the motive of the kidnappers really get a strong reaction out of you. While your heart goes out to the parents, it also confuses you when you can’t really put a finger on what their priorities really are. A kidnapping story also needs that ‘catch me if you can’ kind of cat and mouse chase which lacks here. It felt like either things were getting solved too easily or they had no proper closure. While the protagonist of the film was a strong headed-character, we don’t get to see more of her as a person and there was a lot of potential there. Nepal and India are also quite similar when it comes to language and culture and that was also an interesting aspect in the film. Other than that, there’s very little in the story that keeps you engaged from start to finish given that it's a thriller.

Pooja, Sir had its Indian premiere at the Mumbai Film Festival this year!

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