Revenge never looked so handsome as it does on Heroes star Sendhil Ramamurthy, one of the many actors in Shor, a multi-storyline Hindi remake directed by Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK.

The tense, gripping film, based in Mumbai during  Ganapati, opened New York’s MIAAC Film Festival with a bang last night. What began as a dark, dizzying comedy turned abruptly into a rich, stomach-churning tale of criminal intrigue, classism, and the meaning of Ganapati.

Shor, or “noise,” kicks off with multiple vignettes that ultimately intertwine. Three chummy criminals (including Tilak, played by Tusshar Kapoor) find guns and a bomb in a stolen bag; a fish-out-of-water American (Ramamurthy) attempts to start an unidentified business in Mumbai only to get extorted by locals; a cricket player (Sundeep Kishan) tries to raise money to bribe his way onto a team, and to win the hand of his girlfriend (Girija Oak).

Nidimoru and DK establish the characters in a goofy sketch comedy format, and plenty of the comedy falls flat. Ramamurthy’s character Abhay is a straightlaced, cliched American who dates a model (Preeti Desai) and lives in a city that lightheartedly victimizes him. Tilak and his two buffoon buddies play up the comic relief with clumsy taxi-robbing antics.

Unfortunately, the beginning of the film isn’t any funnier or deeper than a situational sitcom, only it has a cooler soundtrack (Kailash Kher helped set the mood). I braced myself for disappointment and a carefully-worded review.

But as it turns out, the beginning of Shor is deliberately, brilliantly misleading.

The film takes a quick, dramatic turn on all fronts. Pressure on Abhay escalates into extreme violence, and the once one-sided protagonist turns convincingly tortured and vengeful. Tilak makes some endearing life changes — including a religious-like devotion to Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist — after his group’s capers injure an urchin.  Sundeep Kishan’s character considers a life of crime through his sleazy brother Tipu.

All of a sudden, the comedy is minimized, and the true, cringe-worthy consequences reveal themselves.

The film’s intertitles frame Shor’s plot within the 10 days of Ganapati, putting a spiritual stamp on Shor’s themes of innocence, enlightenment, and immortality. The beautifully shot, red powder-soaked Mumbai festival is the only place where all the embattled characters, including the lowlife criminals, converge in peace.

In the end, Shor delivers. The film is so complete and satisfying that even Ramamurthy’s good looks take a backseat to the superbly-woven tension (and that’s saying a lot). Well worth the bungling beginning and the price of admission, Shor was an excellent choice for a MIAAC opener this year.

And I admit it: I cried at the end.