Khufiya

About the film

Khufiya (transl. Secret) is a 2023 Indian Hindi-language spy thriller film written, produced, scored and directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, based on Amar Bhushan's espionage novel Escape to Nowhere. The film stars Tabu, Ali Fazal, Wamiqa Gabbi and Azmeri Haque Badhon (in her Hindi film debut). The film revolves around a Research and Analysis Wing operative who is assigned to track down a mole, who is selling defense secrets, while also grappling with her dual identity as a spy and lover.

Bhardwaj bought the rights for the novel in 2016 and wrote the script with Irrfan Khan in mind. However, with Khan's death in 2020, and other male actors rejecting the script, he rewrote it with a female protagonist and narrated it to Tabu, who accepted the role. The film was announced in September 2021 and principal photography commenced the following month and continued till April 2022, where it was shot predominantly in Delhi and Canada. It was filmed by Farhad Ahmed Delhvi and edited by A. Sreekar Prasad.

Plot

During the post-Kargil War period, Heena Rehman, who is a Bangladeshi woman supposed to be working for ISI, is killed by Bangladeshi defense minister Mirza at a party held at his house, after Mirza receives some information over the phone.

In India, Krishna "KM" Mehra, who is an operative at the Research & Analysis Wing is devastated to know of Heena's death because she used to be her lover for a brief time; Heena was in fact, working for RAW, part of which was to kill Mirza. km boss Jeev tells her that there is a mole in the RAW office who leaked the information leading to Heena's death. KM is assigned to track down this mole selling India's defense secrets. She establishes that RAW employee Ravi, whose lavish lifestyle does not match his income, must be the mole and suspects his wife Charu to be his partner in delivering secrets. KM and Jeev obtain permission to have Ravi's house electronically bugged. After some surveillance, they discover that Ravi is working for the CIA at his money-hungry mother's insistence, and that Charu is innocent.

In the meantime, Jeev discovers that Heena's death was caused not just due to Ravi leaking information to the CIA (who in turn leaked it to Mirza), but because the Minister of Home Affairs had to reveal that information to CIA to prevent the US from cancelling its nuclear deal with India. Despite being appalled that his boss let one of his assets die for keeping the nuclear deal, Jeev decides to keep this a secret to avoid further complications.

Production

Vishal Bhardwaj bought the rights to the espionage novel Escape to Nowhere by Amar Bhushan and had started working on it in 2016. Bhardwaj was keen on doing an espionage thriller as it was the "most juicy genre" due to its attention to detail and the scope it had for suspense elements. Bhardwaj took him nearly two years to prepare the first draft of the screenplay, which he finished in 2018. Bhardwaj then narrated the script to Irrfan Khan, but after his death in 2020, he then narrated to other male actors who rejected the script.

Vishal put the film's pre-production on hold, due to his shift in focusing on television series, and had commissioned two projects for Netflix and Amazon Prime Video: one being an adaptation of the Salman Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children and the other being based on the hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight 814. While the former was pulled out, even before the production was set to commence, works on the latter were halted indefinitely due to the controversy surrounding over Tandav (2021), which led the platform to revise streaming content. Bhardwaj then worked on an episode of the anthology series Modern Love Mumbai and directed the short film Fursat (2023) which was filmed on iPhone 14 Pro.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Bhardwaj decided to rewrite the script to have a female protagonist. He then narrated it to Tabu whom Bhardwaj shared a working relationship since 1995. Impressed by the narration, Tabu agreed to be a part of the film. The film was announced on 25 September 2021 at the Netflix Tudum event, and Ali Fazal and Wamiqa Gabbi were cast in primary roles with Bangladeshi actress Azmeri Haque Badhon making her Hindi film debut. Gabbi was chosen for the role after sharing a similar working relationship with Bhardwaj, as "nobody wanted to play the young mother and I needed a person who would trust me blindly. I had a comfort with her and that’s why we did so many projects together."

Soundtrack

The music of the film is composed by Vishal Bhardwaj, with lyrics by Bhardwaj, Gulzar, and Sufi poems from Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khanan and Kabir. The album was launched at the Raaz Aur Saaz: Khufiya Musical Night event on 7 September 2023, with the presence of the cast members and fans, and featured live performances from Bhardwaj, Rekha Bhardwaj and Sunidhi Chauhan. Their performances were compiled into a four-song live album that released two weeks later.

Marketing and release

In September 2021, a short clip of the film was released from Netflix Tudum: A Global Fan Event. The film's official trailer was launched on 1 September 2023, The film was released on 5 October 2023 through Netflix.

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 59% of 17 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.7/10.

Key details