The Taj Story review: OMG! meets WhatsApp forwards in this over-stretched, lazily written legal drama

It’s 2025, and although we as the audience are immune to the idea of agenda-driven films, makers should at least disguise the sermon as cinema and try to make the experience entertaining, unlike this venture!

Courtroom dramas are one of the most effective genres to execute a social commentary. Packed with powerful dialogues, edge-of-the-seat thrilling moments, and some cinematic liberties, the films transform the complex language of law into a simplified spectacle that compels its viewers to confront the fractures and future of the system they share. But what happens when lunch-time discussions of 5th graders and social media theories are turned into a 2-hour-45-minute feature film? We get The Taj Story!

Directed by Tushar Amrish Goel, The Taj Story stars Paresh Rawal as Vishnu Das, a veteran Taj Mahal guide who discovers evidence that the monument was originally a Hindu temple seized by Shah Jahan. After his viral video costs him his job, he files a public-interest petition in the Supreme Court to unseal the 22 locked chambers for archaeological verification. What follows next is an over-stretched, lazily written, and inconsistent trial that attempts to propel people into rethinking the way they look at their celebrated monument and the history written around it.

Also Read: Why Saurabh Shukla’s Judge Sundar Lal Tripathi is the moral anchor of Jolly LLB!

Right at the start of the film, Das declares that his issue here isn’t communal and that he is simply standing up for the country’s history, but goes on to present his arguments in such an unconvincing manner that you fail to root for the protagonist despite knowing that it’s one of the finest actors of our country at work! Das, in fact, is shown doing very little research himself, presenting his case with poor claims and the kind of jibes that neither provoke thought nor laughter. Rawal gives his all, but falls prey to shoddy writing, incoherent narrative, and a lethargic screenplay that robs him of being the saving grace of the film. His presentation is full of sarcastic remarks that were aimed to be powerful but end up looking like forced punchlines. Zakir Hussain, as the opposing lawyer and Amruta Khanvilkar, as a documentary filmmaker too, are victims of the script.  

While the movie time and again asserts that the issue is about our ‘uncherished history’, its comments on historians, educationalists, and intellectuals are amusing. The Taj Story doesn’t shy away from echoing the populist narrative of demonising not only the Mughals but also the secularists and the leftist, and calling the current version of history ‘intellectual terrorism’. It’s 2025, and although we as audience are immune to the idea of agenda-driven films, makers should at least disguise the sermon as cinema and try to make the experience entertaining, unlike this venture that lacks the emotional grounding or shock value that convinces you to bat for it or at least keep you engaged throughout the run-time. Despite a paced first half, and the skillful cinematography that captures the majestic beauty of Taj, the legal-thriller, drags exhaustingly after the interval and fails monumentally to deliver on its intent - to cross-examine history, identity and power on 70mm. 

Overall, The Taj Story feels like a history-conspiracy rant that desperately wants to be OMG: Oh My God! sans the depth, wit, or intent!

The Taj Story is currently running in cinema halls near you!

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