Film

NH10

Name: NH10
Genre: Crime, Thriller
Released: 2015
Cast: Anushka Sharma, Neil Bhoopalam, Darshan Kumaar, Deepti Naval, Ravi Jhankal

NH10 is a visceral crime thriller about an ordinary couple drawn into rural violence after a fateful intervention. Anushka Sharma carries the film as a woman forced into survival mode when a good deed spirals into nightmare. It's lean, brutal, and genuinely tense—a film that trusts its audience to sit with discomfort.

TMDb rating

3.4

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you want a tense, road-bound thriller where dread grows out of ordinary choices and one fraught decision, the kind of film that makes you argue with the characters on screen.

Skip it if you want your thrillers brisk and plot-heavy, since this one lingers on dread and moral unease at a pace that can feel punishing.

What it asks of you: Expect a compact 115 minutes that builds slowly, with rising pressure and a tone that stays grim rather than lightening up for relief.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Badhaai Ho2018

A sharp, funny film about family secrets and social expectation in modern India. Deeply human and wise without preaching, with brilliant supporting performances and scenes that cut to the bone.

But It's warmer and lighter than NH10—if you want that same raw tension, you'll need to adjust expectations.

Article 152019

A police procedural that interrogates caste violence and systemic indifference with real anger. Gripping on its own terms and as a companion piece to NH10's exploration of how the powerful operate outside law.

But It can feel didactic. The message sometimes overshadows the mystery, and the ending doesn't surprise.

Phobia2016

Another Anushka Sharma lead about a woman in crisis, this time trapped by trauma and agoraphobia. Intimate and claustrophobic in a completely different way—a character study with genuine psychological bite.

But It's a slow, interior film. If you're chasing the highway adrenaline, this goes inward instead.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from NH10

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Piku2015

Both are 2015 films starring Anushka Sharma as a woman asserting control in her own narrative—one through survival, one through refusing to be diminished by expectation. Watching them together shows two sides of how Indian cinema was beginning to frame female agency.

A comedy-drama about a strong woman navigating family duty and her own ambitions, with Anushka Sharma in a completely different register. It shows her range and explores the constraints women navigate in modern India—just without violence.

But It's light and sometimes sentimental. The road trip plot is familiar, and the film doesn't interrogate anything the way NH10 does.

Natrang2010

A Marathi masterpiece about obsession and performance, with a lead character who mutates in ways both darkly comic and deeply unsettling. Stunning filmmaking that questions what we're willing to become.

But It's in Marathi, subtitled, and moves in circles—not a conventional narrative arc. The performance art sequences take patience.

Ugly2013

A film that pulls the mask off middle-class Bombay morality. Anurag Kashyap explores how quickly civilized people become feral when custody is at stake. Uncompromising and intelligent.

But It's relentlessly bleak and didactic. There's almost no one to root for, which is partly the point but exhausting to watch.

Drishyam2015

A rural mystery where an ordinary man has to think several steps ahead of the law. Taut, intelligent, and remarkably effective at building tension from conversation and deception rather than action.

But The pacing is deliberate. It's a thinking person's thriller, not a chase film. Also, the twist depends on accepting certain implausibilities.

Gangs of Wasseypur - Part 12012

Anurag Kashyap's sprawling crime epic about coal, crime, and family vendetta in industrial India. Raw, inventive, violent, and genuinely alive in ways most Hindi cinema isn't brave enough to attempt.

But It's nearly five hours across two parts and deliberately shapeless. Also graphically brutal—the violence isn't stylized, it's meant to disturb.

Raman Raghav 2.02016

A serial killer film that's as much psychological portrait as procedural. Anurag Kashyap again, exploring the fine line between hunter and hunted. Nawazuddin Siddiqui is magnetic and terrifying.

But It's more interested in mood and degradation than plot. The violence is sudden and arbitrary, which is realistic but also deeply uncomfortable.

Trapped2016

Rajkummar Rao alone in an apartment, slowly unraveling. A chamber piece about isolation and human limits that's claustrophobic by design. Minimalist and effective, with genuine stakes.

But Almost no plot. It's a one-man show about hunger and desperation. If you need external conflict and incident, this will feel thin.

Nightcrawler2014

Both films use a catalyst incident to ask: how quickly does a civilized person abandon their principles? Both answer: faster than you'd like to think. But NH10 is about forced survival, while Nightcrawler is about chosen corruption.

An American thriller about a man who profits from urban chaos and violence. Like NH10, it's about ordinary people colliding with systems that don't protect them, and about how desperation corrupts morality. Mesmerizing and sick-making.

But It's slower and more psychological than NH10—a character study disguised as a thriller. Also deeply cynical about institutions and human nature.

The Road2009

Both films are interested in what ordinary people become when removed from safety and social order. NH10 is visceral and immediate; The Road is mythic and literary. But they're asking the same dark question about survival and cost.

An adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel about a parent and child crossing a dead, violent landscape. It's not a thriller in any conventional sense, but it has the same bleakness and the same question: how do you maintain humanity when everything is trying to kill you?

But It's bleak and slow and offers no comfort whatsoever. There's ash and starvation and cannibals, and the film doesn't soften any of it. Hard to watch.