Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout

Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout is a 2024 Indian Hindi-language mystery thriller film directed by Aban Bharucha Deohans, starring Manoj Bajpayee, Prachi Desai and Parul Gulati (in her Hindi film debut) in lead roles. It is the sequel to Silence...Can You Hear It? (2021).

The film was released on ZEE5 on 16 April 2024.

Plot
ACP Avinash Verma and his team are assigned a case of a mass shootout that happened at a club named Night Owl Bar in Mumbai. As the team works on the case they realise there is something much bigger and darker at play.

Cast

 * Manoj Bajpayee as ACP Avinash Verma
 * Prachi Desai as Inspector Sanjana Bhatia
 * Parul Gulati as Aarti
 * Sahil Vaid as inspector Amit Chauhan
 * Vaquar Shaikh as Inspector Raj Gupta
 * Chetan Sharma as Rizwan
 * Randheer Rai as Gaurav
 * Ankit Bhardwaj as Sunny
 * Sujata Mogal
 * Shruti Bapna as Inspector Jaya
 * Manuj Bhaskar as Commissioner of Police Mayank Sharma

Production
Principal photography commenced in South Mumbai in July 2023.

Marketing
The film was formally announced by ZEE5 in March 2023 when the teaser was released. The trailer of the film was released on April 3, 2024.

As a part of the promotions of the film, Manoj Bajpayee hit the streets of Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh.

Release
The film was released on the streaming platform ZEE5 on 16 April 2024.

Reception
Writing for NDTV, Saibal Chatterjee praised Manoj Bajpayee's work stating, "Able to sustain itself through its complement of twists and turns thanks to the solidity that Manoj Bajpayee lends the film."

Bollywood Hungama critic rated 2.5 out of 5 stars and wrote "Despite being an intriguing murder mystery Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout suffers due to the long length and certain loose ends."

Mayur Sanap of Rediff.com rated 1/5 stars and observed "Towards the end of the film, when one character exclaims, 'What a crazy case!' your sentiments feel validated."

The Times of India rated the film three out of five stars and wrote that "Overall, in an otherwise average thriller, it is Manoj Bapayee who powers through his solid, assured act". A critic from News18 gave the film the same rating and wrote that "Silence 2 definitely deserves a watch if you like murder mysteries. And as always, Manoj Bajpayee is at his finest. It’s worth a watch despite the flaws". A critic from TimesNow gave the film the same rating and wrote that "there was real potential and promise in Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout to build something interesting. But the red herrings grow tiresome and the final reveal, in which the antagonist basically reveal all their intentions, drags the story and the film by a good 20 minutes or so".

A critic from Pinkvilla rated the film two out of five stars and wrote that "Silence 2 is a long and tiring watch that simply fails to connect. The performances also fail to match the level of a no-nonsense investigative-thriller". A critic from Outlook rated the film one-and-a-half out of five stars and wrote that "The only good part about Silence 2: The Night Owl Bar Shootout is the camera work. The camera work is smooth, and it keeps your attention in this poorly written whodunit". In a review for India Today, Zinia Bandyopadhyay wrote that, in particular because of its dialogues, the film "fails to impress as a crime thriller despite its potential". Arjun Agarwal, of Medium, stated, "The film throws some twists and turns your way, some predictable, some genuinely surprising. There’s a sense of wanting to be constantly surprised, but a few reveals lack the punch needed to leave you gasping."