PremiumThe Indrani Mukerjea Story – Buried Truth Review – The truth remains buried and absurdity takes over the most callow true crime docu-series in recent times
The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth could be the most absurd and randomly made true crime docu series ever.
Last Updated: 01.46 PM, Mar 02, 2024
In 2012, 25-year-old Sheena Bora went missing for three years, until in 2015, her sister Indrani Mukherjea, along with three others, was arrested for murdering her. Soon it was found that Indrani was actually her mother and not her sister, and the case unfolded like an onion. Still, in court, the prime accused is now out on bail and in a very absurd Netflix docu-series.
The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth Review
I was a teenager when the news of Sheena Bora’s disappearance, then called a murder, broke. The seriousness of the issue was evident in the faces of the elders in the household. A mother had allegedly killed her daughter and now claims that she didn’t, saying the daughter is alive in an undisclosed location. A few years later, news of Indrani Mukerjea and her stories from jail made headlines as I grew up. So when Netflix decided to dive deep into a case so recent and haunting, the first expectation would be an objective approach that is not busy deciding who you must think is right as a viewer. This is a criminal case, and proof points at one person; they cannot be defended on a platform viewed by millions across the globe.
The fact that the case is still in court and yet to get a final verdict makes the docu-series on Netflix even more absurd. This is almost like you are watching someone tell their perspective and possibility of the case with no answer or end to it. So you have already lost the first battle. Written by Sudeep Nigam and directed by Uraaz Bahl with Shaana Levy, The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth doesn’t know what it wants to do. There is no clarity on whether it was made to tell you all the possibilities (like Talvar, but also because it was a feature film) or a vehicle to whitewash one and present the others as cartoons that have framed a lady.
Netflix certainly didn’t do a quality check on this one because how do you defend a project that looks at a prime accused of a heinous murder case as a superhero? For real, the first time we see Indrani’s lawyer and she is sitting in the background, the choice of music in the background is like a superhero entry. There is no anchor to this docu-series that has any structure at all. One person says something, the other denies, and some reveal some very shattering facts, but soon a woman says, “I am ready,” and calls them all fools in different ways. In a docu-series about a crime, you expect to see more than what just the suspects and the ones affected have to say. They have said enough in the public domain already.
What hurts is how The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth makes foolish men out of Mekhail, Indrani’s son from her previous relationship, and her stepson Rahul. The former claims that he first met his mother in his late teens and alleges that she tried to prove him mentally unstable by alleging that he consumed drugs and even tried to make him undergo shock therapy. No one substantiates these claims, so no one can really confirm whether Mekhail is right or not. But in the next moment, Indrani shows a happy picture of Mekhail and denies everything he claims. But who is going to do what is supposed to be done in a true crime docu-series? SUBSTANTIATE whether they have seen it happening on either side.
Rahul, on the other hand, is unknowingly in a relationship with his stepsister. The man has already suffered a lot, as he is the only one concerned about Sheena’s whereabouts. In some scenes, we see his call recordings being used, but he is given such an inconsequential place in this docu-series where his absence doesn’t even matter. He was her fiancé, just so you are aware. The Indrani Mukerjea Story – Buried Truth has absurdity written all over it in bold, and you cannot deny that. Four episodes in, and I am still confused about the point it wanted to make, or was there even any? The same platform made House Of Secrets: The Burari Deaths, one of the best true-crime docu-series ever, and this time the misfire is so bad.
There is also a knowing or unknowing (better known to the makers) attempt to almost whitewash Indrani Mukerjea’s character as if she is a woman with a voice who had to pay for just being a woman. The men took her down with them, and she was a naïve lady who is now suffering because of her gender. There is still a subjudice matter, and a gaze that looks with pity at anyone accused is not appreciated. The point of a documentary is to present facts, not opinions dressed as facts.
The only good thing about the documentary is how it looks at Vidhie, Indrani’s daughter, and the impact all this circus has had on her throughout her growing-up years. Her episode with alcoholism and her struggle to have cops over to her house to investigate a missing/murder case, seeing her parents being involved in a murder case, and just experiencing all of this. The only thing that lands and makes you feel bad about it is this. Everything else makes no sense.
The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth: Final Verdict
If there is any point that The Indrani Mukerjea Story: Buried Truth is trying to make, it has to be that it exists. No one would ever understand the meaning of its existence because it is just randomly absurd.