The Body
- Director
- Jeethu Joseph
- Studio
- Viacom18 Motion Pictures
- Release Date
- 12 December 2019
- Running Time
- 100 min
- Language
- Hindi
- Country
- India
- Budget
- ₹19.00 Cr
- Box Office
- ₹3.47 Cr
Review
Janu Barua's *The Body* attempts a psychological thriller built on paranoia and marital betrayal, but the execution crumbles under the weight of narrative inconsistency and tonal whiplash. The premise—a missing corpse triggering existential dread in a trapped suspect—has genuine potential, yet the film squanders it by oscillating between supernatural suggestion and domestic crime drama without committing to either. Emraan Hashmi delivers a serviceable performance as Ajay, capturing the unraveling psyche adequately, though the material doesn't provide sufficient psychological depth to elevate it beyond surface-level desperation. Sobhita Dhawan's Maya feels underwritten; the flashbacks meant to establish her controlling nature and Ajay's resentment land with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer, making the supposed manipulation feel contrived rather than genuinely toxic.
The film's structural problems become increasingly apparent as it progresses. The morgue setting, which should feel claustrophobic and menacing, instead becomes repetitive and stagey—a single-location thriller that lacks the visual ingenuity to compensate for its confined geography. The "twisted revelation" about Ajay's culpability comes so late and with such muddled motivation that it undermines any sympathy we might've harbored. Director Barua seems uncertain whether he's making a supernatural revenge tale or a procedural crime story, and this indecision sabotages both possibilities. The film's ₹3.47 crore ret
Storyline
So basically, this wealthy businesswoman Maya Verma dies from what looks like a heart attack, but then her body vanishes from the morgue before they can do an autopsy. A cop named Jairaj starts investigating and brings in Maya's husband Ajay for questioning. Turns out Ajay runs a lab and worked for Maya's company, and he's been sneaking around with his girlfriend Ritu on the side. Jairaj gets suspicious and keeps Ajay locked in the morgue until they find Maya's body, which sets off a whole chain of weird stuff.
Things get pretty creepy when Ajay starts experiencing bizarre incidents at the morgue—he feels like Maya's watching him, finds a bottle of toxin lying around, and discovers a phone in another corpse's bag with only calls from Maya. He becomes convinced that Maya's somehow still alive and orchestrating this whole thing to get revenge on him. Through flashbacks, we learn that Maya used to control Ajay with her wealth and power, and his jealousy over her finding out about Ritu drove him to do something unthinkable to make it look natural.
While trapped in the morgue, Ajay realizes that Maya had hired a detective to spy on him and Ritu, so she knew everything about their affair. Panicked and afraid that Maya might come after Ritu, Ajay tells his girlfriend to go into hiding. But when he can't reach her anymore, fear takes over and he breaks down, confessing everything to Jairaj and desperately begging him to protect Ritu from whatever Maya might do next.
