Saying that reviews don’t mean a damn when Netflix subscribers are deciding what to watch is hardly a groundbreaking statement, one that was echoed once again over the weekend as Jennifer Lopez’s resoundingly trashed The Mother conquered the most-watched charts, but it’s still a surprise to see Mrs. Chatterjee Vs Norway emerging as a worldwide sensation.
Per FlixPatrol, the Hindi legal drama inspired by true events has taken custody of the Top 10 in 51 countries around the world to wind up as the streaming service’s fourth most-watched feature on a global level, which wasn’t a predictable outcome considering co-writer and director Ashima Chibber’s movie holds a paltry Rotten Tomatoes score of only 15 percent.
Then again, being panned into the ground hasn’t deterred the customer base in the past, but a 94 percent user rating highlights the divide on the merits of the film, one that sparked such a wide-ranging conversation. The Norwegian Embassy in India issued a statement prior to its theatrical release underlining that although it was based on a real case, the story is “a work of fiction,” which came before the country’s ambassador blasted Mrs. Chatterjee Vs Norway for the way it “incorrectly depicts Norway’s belief in family life and our respect for different cultures.”
Either way, Netflix crowds have been left enraptured by the tale of Rani Mukerji’s Debika Chatterjee, a mother informed by the local authorities in Stavanger that she’s no longer deemed fit to keep custody of her children, forcing her to sue the government in an attempt to win them back.