Writers: Aseem Arrora, Raghav Raj Kakker and Kashyap Kapoor
Director: Hansal Mehta
A heavily crime movie-focused BFI London Film Festival 2023 ends with the world premiere of Aseem Arrora, Raghav Raj Kakker and Kashyap Kapoor’s The Buckingham Murders directed by Hansal Mehta examining a child’s murder in an ordinary British town. This 100-minute police procedural has a rather conventional character base with old-fashioned cops immediately coming into conflict with a hotshot new arrival with her own tragic backstory, and even some rather soapy dialogue, but carves a new path by exploring the dynamics between the Muslim and Sikh communities in High Wycombe.
Against a background of religious violence across the Midlands, a young Sikh boy is found murdered in the woods and a Muslim teenage is immediately in the frame. But newly arrived Detective Sergeant Jass Bhamra is unconvinced by the overly neat trail of evidence and wants to burrow a little deeper, much to the annoyance of her immediate superior Detective Inspector Hardy. As the case becomes increasingly complex, Jass is haunted by the death of her son months before.
The Buckingham Murders has a solid set-up with a range of potentially interesting characters to explore, and audiences will immediately recognise many of the tropes of the police film which delivers on colleague conflict, rookie hunches that pay off and sinister family members who know more than they are prepared to admit. Performed in Hindi and English – often switching between the two mid-sentence – feels naturalistic and Mehta’s film builds up a promising tension with the discovery of the body and the first round of suspect interviews.
But with three writers, the dialogue can be a little flat, relying on pat phrases and occasional jarring speech that distracts from the action. As the story unfolds it becomes increasingly elaborate, looking for twists on twists that make the eventual resolution faintly ludicrous as a variety of subplots come to an overly convenient confluence. The identity of the killer will keep you guessing to the end however and if that’s the core purpose of The Buckingham Murders then it certainly delivers.
It also has a positive, female lead and female colleagues who are dedicated to their jobs without too much distraction from their personal lives, as is too often the case in films like these. Jass, played by Kareena Kapoor, is permitted some space to mourn her son and her own psychological state is repeatedly referenced given the similarities with her own recent experience, but it never detracts from the logical processes of investigation and deduction that lead her to the correct solution.
Adwoa Akoto has a small but equally strong supporting role as fellow officer Sharon who becomes Jass’s main confident while a great supporting role for Keith Allen as a brusk but respectful head of department adds texture. Much like the multi-episode Harlan Corban adaptations for Netflix, Mehta’s film has too many storylines that require some light-footed manoeuvring by the writers to bring them together but it successfully breathes new life into a very old genre with its interesting religious context.
The Buckingham Murders is screening at the BFI London Film Festival 2023.
