Homestay Murders Review: Hoichoi’s latest series stars Saurav Das, Sohini Sarkar, Arjun Chakrabarty, Parno Mittrah, Debchandrima Singha Roy, Aparajita Ghosh, Sabuj Bardhan and Judhajit Sarkar. Directed by Sayantan Ghosal, the screenplay and dialogues are written by Padmanabha Dasgupta. The Bengali series has 6 episodes of 25-30 minutes approximately.
Homestay Murders on Hoichoi TV is produced by Follow Focus Films. The cinematography is by Ramyadip Saha, and the music is composed by Shibasish Banerjee. The series has English subtitles.
Homestay Murders Review Contains No Spoilers
Hoichoi’s Homestay Murders starts with a woman mysteriously getting killed as she walks out of a party. The story then shifts to a hilly region in the North Bengal. A few guests arrive at a homestay to holiday for a few days. Unfortunately, the stay is ruined by the murder of one of the guests. Everyone is a suspect in the story. Who killed the person, and what was their intention? Is the first murder connected to the second one? We find out everything in the end.
Murder mysteries are fascinating and fun to watch if they are done right. With the initial suspense in the first 3 episodes, Homestay Murders keeps you absorbed in its plot. Lucky for the guests, Kinjal (played by Saurav Das) is a cop. He immediately alerts everyone of the dos and don’ts and starts an investigation by making everyone a suspect. Due to bad roads, the cops fail to reach on time. So Kinjal has enough time on his hands to find the truth.
The investigation, secrets and backstories of every character act as a big spoiler for who the murderer is! If you are someone like me who binges on murder mysteries often, guessing the culprit will be easy for you. But the drawback here is Kinjal’s investigation also reveals the killer’s motive. So watching things play out just as I had expected wasn’t much fun. Giving away too much information in the first half is never a good idea.
What works for the series is how the episodes are kept short and precise. However, the last episode was a drag and felt a bit unnecessary. After learning about the killer, one hardly has any interest in knowing more about certain 2 characters because that tone was never set for them. Director Sayantan Ghosal could’ve wrapped the story in the 5th episode by adding 15 minutes to its runtime. Watching the 6th episode seems like a repetition of the information that we already know.
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Coming to direction, the hilly region is always one of the best and most creepy settings for murder and horror stories. Ghosal has made the right choice by taking the characters away from the busy city lights into a dense forest, where people and even the surroundings make one feel uneasy. Ramyadip Saha’s camera captures the eeriness and suspense in the outdoors and indoors.
Coming to performances, Saurav Das is impressive as he is the one who takes charge of the murder and also the show. The rest of Homestay Murders cast also does a good job.
Homestay Murders Review: Final Thoughts
Overall, Hoichoi TV’s latest murder mystery is engaging but predictable. If you want to binge on something simply enjoyable and thrilling for the weekend, this is the show for you. But if you are expecting a solid, startling murder mystery with unexpected plot twists and layered characters, you should skip it.
The series is now streaming on Hoichoi TV.
Have you watched the show yet? Do let us know your thoughts on it in the comments section below.
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