Filhaal To Daayra, Meghna Gulzar’s Films, Ranked

From Filhaal to Daayra, we look at Meghna Gulzar’s filmmaking journey, including the highs of Talvar and Raazi and the films that fell short.

IMAGE: Prithviraj Sukumaran and Kareena Kapoor Khan in Daayra.

How to define Meghna Gulzar as a filmmaker?

She began her career as a nepo child carrying a lot of baggage, being the daughter of two of the finest talents in Indian cinema: Lyricist-filmmaker Gulzar and actress Raakhee.

During his directorial days, Gulzar had created enough noteworthy masterpieces that still remain highly relevant. Would I be wrong in saying there has never been a bad Gulzar movie?

So yes, Meghna Gulzar following in her father’s footsteps naturally comes with the heavy burden of legacy and the crushing expectations that arise from it.

Like her father, she clearly wants to engage with human dramas with a realistic touch, sharing powerful stories while bringing in solid actors to translate her vision onto the screen. Though, the results have been wildly mixed.

Meghna has directed seven feature-length films to date, along with one short (Puran Maashi) in the anthology Dus Kahaniyaan.

Her start in direction was not exactly solid, delivering two underwhelming films in Filhaal and Just Married. She then took a major eight-year gap before making her next feature.

The result was Talvar, arguably one of Bollywood’s best and most solidly acted investigation dramas. She followed it up with the female-driven spy thriller Raazi, which became her highest-grossing movie to date and the second female-led film to cross the Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion) mark at the domestic box office.

Meghna Gulzar was officially here to stay.

However, post-Raazi, her two films, Chhapaak and Sam Bahadur, met with mixed responses from both critics and the box office. The same is unfortunately true for her latest film, Daayra.

It was expected to be a sort of a spiritual followup to Talvar, thanks to its controversial, real-life-based subject and in being an investigation drama. Daayra was, instead, met with a mixed bag of reviews and a cold response at the ticket windows.

Was Daayra truly a return to Meghna Gulzar’s Talvar form? Is Talvar really her best film? What is the absolute most forgettable movie she has ever made?

Sreeju Sudhakaran tries to answer all those questions by ranking all the feature-length films directed by Meghna Gulzar, from the eminently forgettable to an all-time classic.

 

7. Just Married (2007)

IMAGE: Esha Deol and Fardeen Khan in Just Married.

The main issue with Just Married, Meghna’s second film as a director, is that it is simply forgettable. I was actually reminded of its existence only when revisiting her filmography for this feature.

Which says something, because I used to genuinely like a couple of Pritam’s songs from the movie, like Baat Pakki and Jagte Raho, back during my MTV watching days.

Just Married‘s problem was that it came out right after the more memorable Honeymoon Travels Pvt Ltd, a film featuring a similar theme about multiple couples on their honeymoon. Except Just Married did not have Kay Kay Menon dancing to a certified banger like Sajnaji Vaari Vaari.

Just Married is just about watchable if you really want to give it a try. Satish Shah and Kirron Kher’s performances as the older, constantly bickering couple celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary certainly stood out. That is the kindest praise I can offer it.

6. Filhaal (2002)

IMAGE: Sushmita Sen and Tabu in Filhaal.

Meghna Gulzar’s debut film tackled surrogacy, a theme that was bold for its time. Tabu and Sushmita Sen played best friends, with the latter stepping in as a surrogate when Tabu’s character and her husband (Sanjay Suri) could not conceive.

Filhaal is a decent watch backed with a very melodious title track, but is hampered by its melodramatic storytelling. It particularly stumbles in the second half when the screenplay inserts a forced jealousy angle where Tabu’s character suspects her husband is paying more attention to her pregnant best friend than to her and then in the ego-battle between them over who has more rights on the baby.

The performances are quite good, with Sushmita Sen emerging as the film’s surprise package. Except for singer Palash Sen, who made his acting debut as Sen’s boyfriend; the jarring rawness in his performance just couldn’t be missed.

 

5. Sam Bahadur (2023)

IMAGE: Vicky Kaushal in Sam Bahadur.

When it comes to making biopics of famous dignitaries, particularly those who held high posts of power, Indian cinema has a painfully hagiographic approach. The subject is often heavily glamorised to the point where they do not even feel remotely human anymore.

Unfortunately, Meghna’s treatment of the Sam Manekshaw biopic suffers from this exact issue. Casting Vicky Kaushal in the lead was a solid choice considering how the actor has been moving from strength to strength. He definitely looked the part, though in my opinion, Vicky was a bit too showy here, trying to nail the specific idiosyncrasies of Sam Bahadur’s larger-than-life persona.

Meghna covers his crucial role and tactical strategies during the 1971 War as a screen-version of his Wiki page, and such an approach does little to give an insight into the heart and mind of India’s first field marshal.

Meanwhile, the film’s blind idolisation of its central figure also ended up turning then prime minister Indira Gandhi (Fatima Sana Shaikh) into a powerless figure caught entirely in the awe of this dashing military leader.

4. Chhapaak (2020)

IMAGE: Deepika Padukone in Chhapaak.

Chhapaak is a film you want to throw your full support behind, but it constantly holds itself back from letting that happen. It made more news upon release for controversies that had absolutely nothing to do with the actual movie.

Inspired by the life of acid attack survivor Laxmi Agarwal, Chhapaak deals with the protagonist’s transition from the brutal victim of bruised male egos into a powerful role model.

The sequence involving the acid attack and its immediate aftermath is gut-wrenchingly depicted, as is the protagonist’s fierce fight for justice. However, after a certain point, Chhapaak adopts a very docudrama approach in trying to cover the lead’s NGO journey, and the infusion of melodrama in these portions simply does not help.

Deepika Padukone is very good in the lead role but felt miscast when the movie dives into her backstory as a 19-year-old teenager, a backstory the movie did not even really require.

3. Daayra (2026)

IMAGE: Biswapati Sarkar and Prithviraj Sukumaran in Daayra.

Daayra was Meghna’s big attempt to return to her Talvar roots by portraying a contentious issue with a seemingly open-ended approach. This time, the focus was on fake encounters where police deliver ‘street justice’ by shooting down rapists before the case ever reached court.

Seemingly inspired by the 2019 Hyderabad sexual assault and murder of a veterinary doctor and the subsequent police encounter of the alleged culprits, Daayra boasts of solid performances from Kareena Kapoor, playing the officer investigating the encounter, and Prithviraj Sukumaran, the cop who investigated the assault and carried out the encounter.

The investigation portions are pretty engaging and you definitely relate to the anguish of the characters at the lopsided nature of justice system in the country. 

That said, Prithviraj’s presence in the film creates a strange paradox. A few years ago, he starred in the Malayalam hit Jana Gana Mana, where his character fiercely advocated against extra-judicial killings, firmly arguing that only courts should decide guilt.

Now, it is perfectly fine for an actor to take on diametrically opposite characters with entirely different viewpoints. The real issue is the contrasting messaging within the film itself.

Under the incredibly flimsy pretext of neutrality, Daayra actually advocates for these kinds of police encounters, invoking memories of real-life cases to argue its point, while resignedly accepting that the core system simply cannot be changed. That’s… not exactly the right messaging to deliver.

2. Raazi (2018)

IMAGE: Vicky Kaushal and Alia Bhatt in Raazi.

Raazi is sadly talked about more these days because of author Harinder Sikka’s frequent allegations that Meghna did not do justice to his book Calling Sehmat, and because the protagonist’s emotional breakdown scene has morphed into a popular Alia Bhatt meme (‘Mujhe ghar jaana hai‘).

Not to mention, it is frequently compared to a certain segment’s current favourite spy drama, Dhurandhar. Raazi is absolutely no Dhurandhar, and that is exactly why it works well because it gives more prominence to emotional connect over gratuitous violence.

Like most of Meghna’s work, there is a certain melodramatic approach the movie could have easily contained. Nevertheless, Raazi boasts a gripping storyline about a young Indian girl marrying into a Pakistani army family to become a deep-cover spy for the Indian military.

It was thrilling watching the protagonist navigate her in-laws’ unwavering trust while dodging their housekeeper’s rising suspicions and therefore, the movie also hits hard when it delves into the heartbreaking consequences of being a double agent destroying a whole family.

Alia Bhatt suits the part perfectly and is quite decent here, with a then-rising Vicky Kaushal delivering a beautifully gentle performance as her eventually betrayed husband. Jaideep Ahlawat delivers a scene-stealing act as the protagonist’s sardonic mentor and handler.

1. Talvar (2015)

IMAGE: Irrfan Khan in Talvar.

Talvar remains the movie that defines Meghna’s career. It heralded her as a genuinely gutsy storyteller with a sharp eye for tackling bold subjects and getting some truly amazing actors on board.

Inspired by the Aarushi Talwar murder case, Talvar, much like Daayra, attempts to take a neutral approach, but it is glaringly obvious where the sympathies lie.

What it does far better than Daayra is expose the severe, systemic flaws through a haphazard, skewered investigation that was in a desperate rush to pin the blame on the parents and in its blatant victim-shaming, making it impossible to claim that true justice was ever served.

The movie never gets preachy or takes a holier-than-thou approach. The investigation portions are solid, and so are the anthitetical recreations of what happened that fateful night.

The clever infusion of dark humour is quite effective, particularly in the final meeting scene where Irrfan Khan’s character relentlessly pokes holes into the rival report’s findings, though the bitterness of that ending hits harder.

The late actor delivers an absolute masterclass performance, while Konkona Sen Sharma and Neeraj Kabi are brilliant as the victim’s parents.

Talvar firmly remains one of the finest investigation dramas ever made by Bollywood, representing Meghna Gulzar at the peak of her filmmaking powers, a peak she has been struggling to summit again ever since.

Photographs curated by Satish Bodas/Rediff