<img style="float: left;" src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2026/apr/Mayank-Shekhar-new_e.jpg" alt="Mayank Shekhar" width="150" height="76" />There&rsquo;s a shot in actor-auteur <a href="https://www.mid-day.com/news/opinion/article/mid-day-opinion-about-asha--23626428" rel="nofollow">Rajat Kapoor&rsquo;s latest film</a>, Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa (ELSH; Zee5), where a character drops a six of spades from a deck of cards on the table, which implies he&rsquo;s lost &mdash; only to then flip that number to nine.
Meaning, hence, that &ldquo;your six can be my nine&rdquo;.&nbsp;
That expression, you&rsquo;ll recall, became popular, courtesy a Galgotia University employee at the 2026 AI Summit in New Delhi &mdash; over how she was possibly misunderstood on TV, attributing an imported Chinese robotic dog as having been developed by her university&rsquo;s &lsquo;centre of excellence&rsquo; instead!
I bring this up with Rajat, who obviously laughs, &ldquo;Oh, yes, your six, my nine; should&rsquo;ve used it in the [film&rsquo;s] promo, damn!&rdquo; If I&rsquo;m not mistaken, the phrase comes from a scene in an Amitabh Bachchan picture, Aakhree Raasta (1986).&nbsp;
With ELSH, it applies equally to a group of buddies from varied professions, partying together &mdash; entrepreneurs (Neil Bhoopalam, Waluscha De Souza), news anchor (Danish Hussain), philosophy professor (Ranvir Shorey), et al &mdash; who don&rsquo;t quite seem as they are.&nbsp;
It&rsquo;s a matter of interpretation. As with Sohrab Handa himself (Vinay Pathak) &mdash; a brashly unfiltered, aggressive North Indian brat. But as the psychologist (Rajat) at that party analyses, &ldquo;He&rsquo;s not a bully&hellip; There&rsquo;s a soft, vulnerable side to him.&rdquo;
The film opens with Sohrab found murdered in the living room, after the group had wound up for the night, post a day-long wedding anniversary celebration, at a secluded heritage property.&nbsp;
There are a dozen-and-half people. None left the <a href="https://www.mid-day.com/news/opinion/article/better-to-ensure-theres-no-fire-in-the-first-place-23625944" rel="nofollow">bungalow</a>. No one entered either. The killer&rsquo;s among them. ELSH is a whodunnit. Which is a much-loved OTT genre.&nbsp;
I suppose, because murder mysteries seamlessly feed into the addictive urge of the brain to figure from any story: what happens next! You carry on predicting; switching between multiple suspects, motives, alibis&hellip;&nbsp;
Since the plot&rsquo;s the only point for the bed rot &mdash; the conclusion could underwhelm you. That&rsquo;s before you press play, to another, similarly low-key murder mystery, for a movie/series, and dose off.&nbsp;
ELSH is far more character-driven, that way. And the reason I was drawn to the film beyond its product category. &ldquo;Subversion&rsquo;s a big word. I was trying to make a film within [the genre] tropes,&rdquo; writer-director Rajat tells me. This is his &ldquo;first whodunnit&rdquo;, as it were. &nbsp;
Although comparisons to Rajat&rsquo;s thoroughly engaging, Kadakh (2019), might be inevitable: &ldquo;One night. One space. Dead body. Similar group of friends, relatives. It&rsquo;s a companion piece,&rdquo; Rajat admits. But, of course, the feel/purpose is entirely separate.&nbsp;
As is the nature of repartees, banter &mdash; with stronger subtext on the world for what it is &mdash; or even the shooting style. &ldquo;Kadakh was mainly hand-held. Shots [in ELSH] are very choreographed. It was exciting to have 15-16 characters [simultaneously] in the same frame,&rdquo; Rajat recalls.&nbsp;
Which, he reckons, was only impossible, because the actors &mdash; pretty much all of them in top-form &mdash; were present, throughout, while they shot the movie in Lonavala, over 28 days flat.&nbsp;
Who did I love the most in ELSH? Actor Chandrachoor Rai. He plays Sohrab Handa&rsquo;s younger brother. He was there in Kadakh too. And in Rajat&rsquo;s best work yet, the adorable Ankhon Dekhi (2013) &mdash; &ldquo;fresh out of FTII, when he auditioned for the part.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Who was I most surprised to see? Filmmaker <a href="https://www.mid-day.com/news/opinion/article/subways-should-not-be-used-for-dumping-garbage-23625590" rel="nofollow">Sharat Katariya</a> (Dum Laga Ke Haisha), as an extra-submissive guy, blatantly tormented by Sohrab (Vinay), and therefore &mdash; like everybody else &mdash; key suspect for the said murder.&nbsp;
Rajat says, &ldquo;That&rsquo;s also how Vinay behaves with Sharat as a friend,&rdquo; in real life. Hence, Sharat was brought onboard, because actor Manu Rishi had to opt out 15 days before shoot.&nbsp;
Manu is a Rajat-regular. As are Ranvir Shorey, Saurabh Shukla (who plays the cop). Vinay Pathak, of course, is often the co-actor with Rajat, including Bheja Fry (2007), where Vinay played the bloke being bullied, instead!
Rajat&rsquo;s technical crew remains the same too &mdash; Meenal Agarwal (production designer), Rafey Mehmood (cinematographer), Suresh Pai (editor), Resul Pookutty (sound designer), Sagar Desai&nbsp; (music composer)&hellip;. &nbsp;
I guess this sorta continuity lends the production a natural sense of play &mdash; as in riffing off each other. Check the dumb charades sequence, in particular. Could be straight outta your own house party.&nbsp;
Rajat debuted as director with the film-noir, Private Detective (1997), that also involved a murder. It never got released. I did once get hold of its tape to restore and screen at a festival I was curating. The so-called film conservationist champion disappeared, because he saw no personal fame in doing it.&nbsp;
Rajat&rsquo;s RK/Rkay (2021) &mdash; an absolute entertainer, about a character who vanishes from a movie screen in its raw footage &mdash; is yet to release. ELSH premiered at MAMI in 2023, three years before it&rsquo;s dropped on Zee5.&nbsp;
I wonder if everybody must love Rajat more? He sighs, &ldquo;In a <a href="https://www.mid-day.com/news/opinion/article/saluting-mumbais-golden-generation-the-original-invincibles-23625174" rel="nofollow">parallel universe</a>, I could be Rajat Kapoor, who&rsquo;s only made Private Detective; he&rsquo;s doing theatre, and he&rsquo;s happy. That&rsquo;s a clear possibility. The fact that I&rsquo;ve made nine films &mdash; just the way I wanted to &mdash; itself is huge!&rdquo;
Mayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture. He tweets @mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com The views expressed in this column are the individual&rsquo;s and don&rsquo;t represent those of the paper.

Why I think everybody will love Rajat Kapoor’s chamber piece, murder mystery, Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa...

Because your six can be my nine!

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Because your six can be my nine!

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