GET SET FOR THE INSIDE EDGE 68
Inside Edge, an Amazon India television series about the Mumbai Mavericks, a fictional 20/20 cricket team in an imaginary Power Play League, gets off to a rousing start. While his teammates are frantically searching for him in the underbelly of the huge stadium (he’s next man in and they’ve just lost a wicket), teenage hunk and star batsman Vayu Raghavan (Tanuj Virwani) is pounding away on a blond cheerleader on the brink of orgasm. Vayu makes it to the crease in time and launches his first ball into the adoring crowd for a sixer.
Any fears that Inside Edge might be a clichéd glamourisation of the IPL are quickly dispelled. Barely minutes into the first episode, we are introduced to Prashant Kanaujia (brilliantly acted by Siddhant Chaturvedi)—a strapping tearaway fast bowler from a tiny village in Uttar Pradesh who is a Dalit and a newcomer to the team. He is immediately hazed in the filthiest language by his uppercaste teammate from the same state. As the episodes unfold, the viscera of Indian racism, classism, casteism, sexism and, indeed, the sheer barbarism of our treatment of those on ‘a lower rung’ is laid bare.
Offshore crime bosses, cokesniffing players, murdered managers, homosexual Bollywood heroes, billionaire betters, scions of industry, fixed matches and crumbling marriages weave through suspenseful episodes that are tautly edited, perfectly cast and technically first rate. Presiding serenely over the entire mise en scene is aging movie star Zarina Malik (superbly acted by a sumptuous Richa Chadha) herself locked in a highstakes tussle with the evil Vikranth Dhawan (overplayed by a hammy Vivek Oberoi) for the heart and coffers of the Mumbai Mavericks.
The plot lines of the various episodes combine enough fact, fiction and rumour to create endless guessing games as to the ‘real’ identities of various protagonists. We get a glimpse of the colossal scale of money being transacted all over the world as bets are placed on noballs, wides, runouts, wins and losses— and fortunes made and lost in seconds.
One of the main weaknesses of Inside Edge is the portrayal of the cricket itself: the sheer energy of heaving stadiums and the pulsating atmosphere of the dugout just don’t get across. Nor does the cricketing action itself seem very authentic. The recent biopic MS Dhoni: The Untold Story (2016) does a much better job. And while the subtitling had its moments (rendering c**tia as ‘f***wit’ was brilliant) there were one too many clangers for a serial of this budget and quality.
In the final episode, the simmering resentment of Prashant Kanaujia explodes into cathartic violence against his upper caste nemesis, and the encounter is stunning in its power. Yet, Inside Edge is no easy morality play: goodies and baddies are difficult to sort out, and venality and corruption are seen as inextricable from pursuing the good life in contemporary India. And for that, among other reasons, it’s definitely worth a watch. Game on!
—Sankaran Krishna
TAUTLY EDITED, WELL CAST, TECHNICALLY SLICK. THE WEAK SPOT? THE CRICKET ITSELF