Directed by : Zoya Akhtar, Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee and Karan Johar
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10230404/
After Bombay Talkies and Lust Stories, talented directors, Zoya Akhtar, Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee and Karan Johar return with new short stories (roughly 35 minutes each), this time taking on the horror genre.
Zoya Akhtar
Darwaaze pe koi hai..
Sameera (Jhanvi Kapoor), a nurse, arrives at a mansion to look after a old lady Mrs Malik (Surekha Sikri) who is suffering from many diseases and whose son was supposed to be there over weekend but there is no sight of him. Meanwhile, Sameera is looking forward to meet Guddu (Vijay Varma) later at the house, who is having affair with her despite been a married guy. Both the plots have a common theme which is 'waiting' and we get a key scene where Mrs Malik tells Sameera that if she had her life she won't wait for Guddu. Unfortunately the horror reveal raises too many questions, like how the readings hold up when it was ghost of Mrs Malik all the time even if for a moment you accept that the point is the ghost might just change the life of Sameera planting the seed of Guddu ain't worth it. The horror elements are mostly regular, starting with scene where Sameera is sitting alone on bench with background of gloomy weather and tree with no leaves and crows all around cleverly not showing it was just dull opposite side of a regular busy Mumbai road. While at house its the noises coming at night, door opening and others. Performances of both Jhanvi and Surekha Sikri is spot on. Vijay Varma is pretty much wasted. Watchable, but the premise and rainy Mumbai backdrop deserved better, you just miss the thrills.
Anurag Kashyap
Maasi ab sirf ansh ko pyaar karegi..
Neha (Sobhita Dhulipala) is pregnant again, after having lost her child last time. She has a nephew Ansh (Zachary Braz) who isn't quite happy that there would be someone else too coming in future, feeling possessive to have the love her maasi gives him get split. This short is easily most wierd of all which is expected been Kashyap as director. From what I could understand, Neha had seen how her sister was scolded by their mom for bringing a crow's egg and warning one day someone would take away her child too which happens with Neha (not her sister). And then there's supernatural powers Ansh has got, maybe he is some kind of Satan child, who wants the unborn child dead as seen from the drawing and worm scenes. The unstable mental side of Neha is shown many times through the scenes she spends in the attic, one of it was very tough to see where she sees the big creature like crow in mirror and then thinks she herself got wings and begins scratching her skin. Wonderful performance by Sobhia Dhulipala. Its again a watchable short, maybe Kashyap goes too much into visual metaphor scenarios, might have worked better keeping it simple.
Dibakar Banerjee
Jo khaate hai, unko woh nahi khaate ..
A visitor (Sukant Goel) arrives on a job at Smalltown having been dropped 4 kms before the village by the autorickshaw guy. But as he reaches the place, he finds mysterious wierd things happening in town, people are acting like zombies and eating humans with only 2 children left alive, one boy (Aditya Shetty) and another girl (Eva Ameet Pardeshi). Interestingly, not a single character in this short has a name to be called with. Its basically a social commentary on the system prevailing between powerful and non powerful, its upto you whether you take it politically or society or any religious manner. As the boy says 'don't move' equals don't raise voice against the powerful people or the mention of 'jo khaate hai, unko woh nahi khaate' leading to if you do as the corrupted people ask you to then they won't trouble you at all. There's lot of metaphors Dibakar uses, to such a extent that he shows zombies in different manner, there's actually a leader among Zombie who can even think. Now some may not like this aspect and call it bullshit or kuch bhi, I felt as a nightmare with the zombies angle not real, this was very well done by the writing team. And then the final scene, where the visitor is been feeded food giving the hint he is joining the wrong people side and the good days for the BigTown will continue. Easily the best short of the film, Dibakar is in tremendous form, except for that gore scene of guy eating flesh there was nothing to dislike.
Karan Johar
All I needed to hear was 'Goodnight Granny'...
Ira (Mrunal Thakur) meets Dhruv (Avinash Tiwar) as their families are going through the formalities of their arranged marriage. But Ira finds Dhruv has a certain attachment to his granny even after her death. She feels all will be fine after marriage, but has no idea it was only going to get worse. Firstly, what I don't get is, if they got 4 months before getting married as told in story, didn't they meet enough to notice how creepy Dhruv was whenever talk came about granny. Even if I ignore that flaw, the point of story is so childish, there's a granny who wants to hear 'GoodNight' daily from Dhruv or play peekaboo. There's the scene where Ira just abuses numerous times using 'fuck' word to granny, and that was the only likeable scene for me, because I felt as frustrated with this short as she felt for a unseen granny who gets so much attention in house. Was excited to see Avinash Tiwari post Laila Majnu brilliance, but it was a disappointment to see him in this role. There was almost no jump scare scenes in previous 3 shorts, but you get numerous ones in here. Clearly, Karan Johar has to learn or not do another horror genre in future, specially if he's still gonna stick to the weddings and rich families here too.
So, there was Dibakar's short story that totally stood out, while Karan Johar's one was cringeworthy to the fullest that leaves a bad taste since its the last short. Zoya and Anurag stories had potential but just lacked the 'wow' factor. The one likeable aspect atleast of the 1st three stories is that you aren't forced to watch those crap looking ghosts/aatma, rather the ghosts in these stories is the situation or the kind of life you had in past. So, if you are looking for horror in literal sense then you would be disappointed, otherwise you can give it a chance.
My Rating : 5/10
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10230404/
After Bombay Talkies and Lust Stories, talented directors, Zoya Akhtar, Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee and Karan Johar return with new short stories (roughly 35 minutes each), this time taking on the horror genre.
Zoya Akhtar
Darwaaze pe koi hai..
Sameera (Jhanvi Kapoor), a nurse, arrives at a mansion to look after a old lady Mrs Malik (Surekha Sikri) who is suffering from many diseases and whose son was supposed to be there over weekend but there is no sight of him. Meanwhile, Sameera is looking forward to meet Guddu (Vijay Varma) later at the house, who is having affair with her despite been a married guy. Both the plots have a common theme which is 'waiting' and we get a key scene where Mrs Malik tells Sameera that if she had her life she won't wait for Guddu. Unfortunately the horror reveal raises too many questions, like how the readings hold up when it was ghost of Mrs Malik all the time even if for a moment you accept that the point is the ghost might just change the life of Sameera planting the seed of Guddu ain't worth it. The horror elements are mostly regular, starting with scene where Sameera is sitting alone on bench with background of gloomy weather and tree with no leaves and crows all around cleverly not showing it was just dull opposite side of a regular busy Mumbai road. While at house its the noises coming at night, door opening and others. Performances of both Jhanvi and Surekha Sikri is spot on. Vijay Varma is pretty much wasted. Watchable, but the premise and rainy Mumbai backdrop deserved better, you just miss the thrills.
Anurag Kashyap
Maasi ab sirf ansh ko pyaar karegi..
Neha (Sobhita Dhulipala) is pregnant again, after having lost her child last time. She has a nephew Ansh (Zachary Braz) who isn't quite happy that there would be someone else too coming in future, feeling possessive to have the love her maasi gives him get split. This short is easily most wierd of all which is expected been Kashyap as director. From what I could understand, Neha had seen how her sister was scolded by their mom for bringing a crow's egg and warning one day someone would take away her child too which happens with Neha (not her sister). And then there's supernatural powers Ansh has got, maybe he is some kind of Satan child, who wants the unborn child dead as seen from the drawing and worm scenes. The unstable mental side of Neha is shown many times through the scenes she spends in the attic, one of it was very tough to see where she sees the big creature like crow in mirror and then thinks she herself got wings and begins scratching her skin. Wonderful performance by Sobhia Dhulipala. Its again a watchable short, maybe Kashyap goes too much into visual metaphor scenarios, might have worked better keeping it simple.
Dibakar Banerjee
Jo khaate hai, unko woh nahi khaate ..
A visitor (Sukant Goel) arrives on a job at Smalltown having been dropped 4 kms before the village by the autorickshaw guy. But as he reaches the place, he finds mysterious wierd things happening in town, people are acting like zombies and eating humans with only 2 children left alive, one boy (Aditya Shetty) and another girl (Eva Ameet Pardeshi). Interestingly, not a single character in this short has a name to be called with. Its basically a social commentary on the system prevailing between powerful and non powerful, its upto you whether you take it politically or society or any religious manner. As the boy says 'don't move' equals don't raise voice against the powerful people or the mention of 'jo khaate hai, unko woh nahi khaate' leading to if you do as the corrupted people ask you to then they won't trouble you at all. There's lot of metaphors Dibakar uses, to such a extent that he shows zombies in different manner, there's actually a leader among Zombie who can even think. Now some may not like this aspect and call it bullshit or kuch bhi, I felt as a nightmare with the zombies angle not real, this was very well done by the writing team. And then the final scene, where the visitor is been feeded food giving the hint he is joining the wrong people side and the good days for the BigTown will continue. Easily the best short of the film, Dibakar is in tremendous form, except for that gore scene of guy eating flesh there was nothing to dislike.
Karan Johar
All I needed to hear was 'Goodnight Granny'...
Ira (Mrunal Thakur) meets Dhruv (Avinash Tiwar) as their families are going through the formalities of their arranged marriage. But Ira finds Dhruv has a certain attachment to his granny even after her death. She feels all will be fine after marriage, but has no idea it was only going to get worse. Firstly, what I don't get is, if they got 4 months before getting married as told in story, didn't they meet enough to notice how creepy Dhruv was whenever talk came about granny. Even if I ignore that flaw, the point of story is so childish, there's a granny who wants to hear 'GoodNight' daily from Dhruv or play peekaboo. There's the scene where Ira just abuses numerous times using 'fuck' word to granny, and that was the only likeable scene for me, because I felt as frustrated with this short as she felt for a unseen granny who gets so much attention in house. Was excited to see Avinash Tiwari post Laila Majnu brilliance, but it was a disappointment to see him in this role. There was almost no jump scare scenes in previous 3 shorts, but you get numerous ones in here. Clearly, Karan Johar has to learn or not do another horror genre in future, specially if he's still gonna stick to the weddings and rich families here too.
So, there was Dibakar's short story that totally stood out, while Karan Johar's one was cringeworthy to the fullest that leaves a bad taste since its the last short. Zoya and Anurag stories had potential but just lacked the 'wow' factor. The one likeable aspect atleast of the 1st three stories is that you aren't forced to watch those crap looking ghosts/aatma, rather the ghosts in these stories is the situation or the kind of life you had in past. So, if you are looking for horror in literal sense then you would be disappointed, otherwise you can give it a chance.
My Rating : 5/10
){kind=link}
0 Comments