Hello friends. I went to the cinema this week. I'm hoping to go more often this month!
This week's movie: Roohi.
Horror and comedy don’t seem to be obvious bedfellows at first glance, but if you think about it, both function on the unexpected. A horror film won’t scare you and a comedy won’t make you laugh if it’s predictable. Seen that way, perhaps it’s not so surprising that filmmakers would want to combine both. The problem is that of all film genres, horror and comedy are the ones that live closest to the border of foolishness. Roohi crosses that border.
It’s the story of Bhawra (Rajkummar Rao with brown hair) and Kattani (Varun Sharma with red), who live in an unnamed village that cheerfully practises pakdaai shaadi: marriage by kidnapping. A troupe of young men kidnap the young woman their friend wants to marry, whisk her away to the marital home and force her into the marriage. This is the way it is, and the elders endorse it as the youngsters indulge in it.
Bhawra and Kattani meet a foreign filmmaker (Alexx O’Nell) who decides to film this phenomenon as though it’s simply another harmless tradition. Very quickly, though, this filmmaker character is forgotten (until the climax, when he is just as suddenly brought back) and Bhawra and Kattani are sent by their boss – or ‘bose’, as Bhawra pronounces it – to kidnap a new young woman. This woman is the eponymous Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor) and she is to marry … someone. I was never clear who. Bhawra and Kattani take her to a hut in a forest – once again, I wasn’t sure why. Before they know it, the marriage deal has fallen through and their boss (Manav Vij) instructs them to free Roohi. By this point, though, the men have discovered that Roohi is also given to transforming into a demon-woman with a cracked face, who likes climbing the walls (literally). Bhawra is supposedly scared silly, but when Roohi becomes human again, he suddenly … falls in love with her!
Are you seeing what my problem is? The film is incoherent, veering between silly comedy, ordinary horror and puzzling exposition. Roohi was supposed to be married once earlier but she was possessed on her wedding day. Why? No clue. A batty old woman declares at length that the only way to rid Roohi of the demon is to get her married to a married man, so that the demon-spirit (desirous of marriage after having had a thwarted one herself in a previous life, I think) gets angry and leaves her body. So Bhawra decides to marry a dog and then marry Roohi – ! It’s both stupid and needlessly convoluted.
The climax, which seeks to send some message about marriage not being the be-all and end-all of a woman’s life, just goes on and on, making no sense whatsoever, but making Kapoor shriek endlessly. It’s a good idea in theory, the message, but it’s buried under a mountain of incoherence and tacky acting. Kapoor is able, but saddled with many boring scenes. Rao and Sharma ham a bit and get a few laughs, but nothing can save a muddled script. There are a few high points: Kattani, for instance, falls in love with the demon-woman version of Roohi, who is called Afza (don’t ask), and every time he sees her the background score hilariously erupts into cheery ’90s love songs. The score itself is pretty interesting, using flutes and other unusual instruments. But, like I said, nothing can save an indifferent and confused screenplay. The film works hard but ends up eminently forgettable.
Roohi is in cinemas.
Recommended viewing:
Don't watch Roohi if you haven't. Instead, here's an interesting short film from Pakistan. SWIPE is about an app called iFatwa that lets you condemn or forgive people for sins. If they get 10,000 'kill' swipes, they get killed. What happens when the young child protagonist becomes obsessed with swiping away?
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