@18 All Time Dourer Upor: When Iresh Zaker Becomes the Man Behind the Chaos

Some performances aren’t about screen time. They’re about what you do with the time you’re given. In the 2013 telefilm @18: All Time Dourer Upor, Iresh Zaker wasn’t the lead. He didn’t carry the story. But what he did was something far more specific. He made every moment he appeared in land exactly the way it was supposed to. This is a look at that role and what made it work.

At-a-Glance

• Title: @18: All Time Dourer Upor
• Type: Telefilm
• Release Year: 2013
• Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance, Adventure
• Director: Adnan Al Rajeev
• Based On: Original Screenplay
• Iresh Zaker’s Role: Hijacker’s Assistant

The Hook & Plot Summary (Without Spoilers)

@18: All Time Dourer Upor is built on one of the most universally relatable ideas you can put on screen. A young man named Imran falls for a girl he met on a social site and decides to go on a journey to finally meet her, dragging his friends along for the ride. What follows is a road trip filled with unexpected detours, comic encounters, and the kind of chaos that only seems to find people when they’re in a hurry.

Produced by Airtel Bangladesh Ltd. and directed by Adnan Al Rajeev, the telefilm carries a light, breezy energy that makes an 80-minute runtime feel like time well spent. It stars Tawsif Mahbub as Imran, alongside Mishu Sabbir, Allen Shubhro, and Sabnam Faria as Aroni, the girl at the end of the journey.

The road, as it turns out, has plenty of surprises in store and not all of them are welcome ones.

Iresh Zaker’s Role & Performance

The Character

The Hijacker’s Assistant isn’t the kind of character you build a story around. He’s the kind you build a scene around, and in @18, that’s exactly what happens. Paired with Zakia Bari Momo’s Hijacker, Iresh steps into the telefilm as the sidekick of an already unlikely villain, bringing a layer of comedy that amplifies every moment the two share on screen.

What makes the character interesting is precisely how small the role is on paper and how much life it takes on in practice. The Hijacker’s Assistant exists to be funny, to react, and to be outrun by the absurdity of the situation. Iresh does all three with a straight-faced sincerity that makes it even funnier.

The Performance

There’s a particular skill in making a supporting comedy role feel complete rather than incidental. Iresh Zaker has it. His Hijacker’s Assistant isn’t just a prop for the gag. He’s a character who seems to have his own logic, his own sense of purpose, even if that purpose is completely misguided.

The dynamic between him and Zakia Bari Momo is one of the telefilm’s most entertaining threads. They play off each other with a timing that feels natural rather than rehearsed, and Iresh’s reactions in particular add a texture to the comedy that keeps it from feeling one-note.

It’s a small role, but it’s played with full commitment. And that commitment is exactly what makes it memorable. It’s the same instinct that has consistently defined his work on screen, whether he’s carrying a scene or simply making someone else’s scene better. His television journey has always been rooted in that kind of honesty, and it shows here too.

Overall Review & Themes

At its heart, @18: All Time Dourer Upor is about the gap between a plan and reality. Imran has a clear goal. His friends have their own distractions. The road, and everyone on it, has other ideas. It’s a setup that allows the telefilm to be funny without trying too hard, because the humor grows naturally from the characters rather than from situations designed to be comedic.

Director Adnan Al Rajeev keeps the pacing light and the tone warm throughout, never letting the telefilm drag or overstay its welcome. The result is something that works equally well as a youth comedy and as a road adventure, a balance that isn’t easy to strike.

Iresh Zaker’s presence in the middle of this, even in a supporting capacity, adds to the ensemble’s overall texture. Comedy works best when the whole cast is in sync, and in @18, it shows.

The Verdict

@18: All Time Dourer Upor is a cheerful, well-put-together telefilm that holds up as one of the more enjoyable Bangladeshi comedy productions of its time. Iresh Zaker’s role as the Hijacker’s Assistant may be brief, but it’s exactly the kind of performance that reminds you how much a skilled actor can bring to even the smallest part of a story.

If you’d like to see another side of Iresh Zaker altogether, Monkey Bizness is well worth your time.