Death by Scotland

 Neeyat (2023) has all the elements of a classic Agatha Christie-style mystery: an isolated Scottish castle cut off from the outside by a terrible storm, a cast of colorful characters who all have their own motives for murder, and a script which is loosely adapted from Christie's book Hercule Poirot's Christmas.

Wealthy businessman Ashish Kapoor (Ram Kapoor), known to friends and family as "AK", has had a rough couple of years.  He's lost a large amount of money, his tech company has crumbled, and he hasn't paid any employees in over two years, a fact which has led to multiple suicides.  Still, AK is beyond Indian jurisdiction, he's rich, and he owns a small castle off the coast of Scotland, so he's throwing himself a birthday party with a special surprise guest.

The guest list includes Jimmy (Rahul Bose), the brother of AK's late wife, her drug addicted son Ryan (Shashank Arora), Ryan's new girlfriend Gigi (Prajakta Koly), AK's new girlfriend Lisa (Shahana Goswami), former Bollywood star Noor (Dipannita Sharma) and her disgraced plastic surgeon husband Sanjay (Neeraj Kabi), their son Ishaan (Madhav Deval), AK's orphaned niece Sasha (Ishika Mehra), and AK's psychic advisor Zara (Niki Aneja Walia)  and her little dog Rumi.  Do they all have motives for murder?  They do!

The staff may not have motives for murder.  AK's personal assistant Kay (Amrita Puri) is absolutely devoted to him, and event planner Tanveer (Danesh Razvi) is mostly just smug.  The rest of the castle's staff left early because they wanted to get home before Storm Irene hit and conveniently cut the castle off from the outside world.

And then there's that surprise guest.  CBI officer Mira Rao (Vidya Balan), who arrives just ahead of the storm.  AK introduces her to the other guests, explaining that he's decided to turn himself in, also handing his assets over to the Indian government. And then Gigi enters the room dressed as AK's late wife, just before the chandelier falls and a fight breaks out.  AK storms off into the . . . . well, the storm.  Mira follows, but is hit from behind by an unknown assailant.   When she comes to, AK is lying at the bottom of the cliff in a pool of blood, and there's no way to reach him.  Mira suspects foul play, but Zara insists that she saw him jump.

There is a mystery and while Mira is well out of her jurisdiction, she's the closest thing to an authority figure available, so she starts to investigate, with mixed success.  Mira is obviously brilliant and very observant, but she seems uncomfortable with other aspects of police work, and especially with using the gun she carries.  She persists, but the bodies just keep piling up.

Neeyat has a complicated plot, and literally everybody is hiding something, with the possible exception of Rumi.  Still, the mystery plays fair, secrets revealed make sense given what has gone before, and it is possible to figure out what is going on.  However, the tone is decidedly quirky; the mystery is played straight, but some of the characters are surprisingly genre aware, and there are wry comments.  Mira is not one of those characters.

The best reason to watch this movie is Vidya Balan; her Mira is an intriguing detective, more Monk than Poirot, but with an insecurity all her own, wrapped around an inner core of righteous anger.  It's enough to make me overlook the fact that the local police, when they finally arrive, introduce themselves as being from Scotland Yard.