Toaster Movie Review | Anupama Chopra | THR India

Anupama Chopra reviews Toaster, the gleefully goofy morality tale now streaming on Netflix, directed by Vivek Daschaudary in his feature debut and marking Patralekha’s producing debut. Rajkummar Rao plays Ramakant, a miser of epic proportions — a man who chases six-rupee refunds, steals biscuits from an orphanage, and believes children are a “lifetime investment with zero returns.” When Ramakant and his wife Shilpa (Sanya Malhotra) give an expensive toaster as a wedding gift and the wedding is called off, his frantic attempts to retrieve it pull him into a series of misadventures involving lying, stealing, blackmail over a sexually explicit video, and a fabulously twisted relationship with a neighbour who is not at all what she seems. Anupama highlights the sharp writing by Anagh Mukherjee, Parveez Shaikh and Akshat Ghildial (co-writer on Badhaai Ho and Badhaai Do), and a supporting cast in top form — Abhishek Banerjee as the confused, smoked-up neighbour; Seema Pahwa as the landlord with constipation woes; Farah Khan as the greedy head of an orphanage; Upendra Limaye as a cop; and above all, Archana Puran Singh as Pherwani aunty, who redefines every cliché about aging widows. Without losing its lightness, Toaster touches on mental illness, corrupt cops and politicians, and the sidelining of senior citizens. It also ends with a remix of the classic cabaret number Husn Ke Lakhon Rang from Johny Mera Naam (1970). The second hour lags, but overall it’s a solid start. Watch Toaster on Netflix — and that is the THR bottomline.