Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Haseen Dillruba’ on Netflix, An Erotic Thriller About A Love Triangle Gone Awry

From Netflix India, Haseen Dillruba (which translates to Beautiful Beloved), is a new entry in the erotic psychological thriller genre that focuses on a love triangle gone wrong. At just over two hours, is the thriller twisty enough to hold an audience’s attention?

HASEEN DILLRUBA: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Detectives are investigating the site of a major residential gas explosion that has left Rishu (Vikrant Massey) dead and his wife Rani (Taapsee Pannu) the main suspect. In a flashback that unravels a dark love story, Rishu meets Rani via an arranged marriage set-up. But their marriage lacks sparks and Rani, feeling rejected, seeks solace in an extramarital affair which unlocks an obsessive, dangerous turn in Rishu. At the end, there is a dead body in the ground—but is it a crime of passion or an insidious murder?

What Will It Remind You Of?: An erotic thriller mixed with a literary crime drama, it’ll make you think of the likes of the Beyonce vehicle Obsessed while also drawing on the French series Lupin.

Performance Worth Watching: Vikrant Massey as Rishu is far and away the scene stealer, vacillating easily between kind and sincere, and vicious and violent. When he’s onscreen, he’s captivating, using his entire face to convey which version of Rishu we’re getting.

Memorable Dialogue: “A husband-and-wife relationship is like a delicate thread. You have to handle it with the utmost care. If you don’t, it will break.” At first glance this is probably referencing divorce. But in this world, where anything can happen, it’s definitely talking about murder!

Sex and Skin: Yes! Though it’s minimal, one of the many initial conflicts in Act I is that there’s no sexual chemistry between the main couple. Over the course of two hours Haseen Dillruba takes steps forward via a cleavage shot here and a sexual encounter that lasts all of five seconds there—just sexual enough to whet the appetite but still tame enough to watch with your mother.

Our Take: The romantic thriller genre is not a new one, but placing it in the confines of a traditional Indian marriage breathes some new life into it. Conflict in Haseen Dillruba is initially drawn via a push-and-pull against customary Desi expectations: Rani is anything but the homely wife that she is expected to be, and her inability to conform to these expectations causes major friction with not only her husband but also her in-laws. It was, then, a rewarding twist that when she begins to embrace traditional roles—like making chai or cleaning clothes—it is for more salacious reasons that ultimately draw out animalistic urges from Rishu.

The central performances in the film anchor the somewhat wild story, led by Pannu and Massey. As the third spoke in the wheel, Harshvardhan Rane also holds his own as the smoldering cousin who causes a rift in the household. Without these three all playing the hero and the villain at the same time, the film would lose some of its edge in terms of what makes it feel believable even as the story spirals.

Many critics have frowned upon the film’s seeming endorsement of a toxic love affair, assuming that Haseen Dillruba is glamorizing the twisted nature of the central marriage. But I think beyond the fact that it’s a great breeding ground for characters that act on impulse and is a perfect table setting for dissecting human nature, no one in their right mind would watch this film and hope that their own life’s love story emulates this one.

If there is to be one flaw, it is the ending. Without spoiling, the ultimate resolution falls a little flat and leans on a clue that was foreshadowed slightly but not quite enough to pull off as a grand reveal. With a bit more precise plotting, it could have felt satisfying but unfortunately Haseen Dillruba slightly misses that mark.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Though the ending ran out of steam, it’s still worth the ride.

Radhika Menon (@menonrad) is a TV-obsessed writer based in New York City. Her work has appeared on Paste Magazine, Teen Vogue, and Brown Girl Magazine. At any given moment, she can ruminate at length over Friday Night Lights, the University of Michigan, and the perfect slice of pizza. You may call her Rad.

Watch Haseen Dillruba on Netflix