After months, I had to review a movie! I was not into this since March. Infact I could not watch many movies during the season. But now I feel I have to review this wonderful remake of the ever green classic Malayalam movie "Manichitrataazh".
a little flash back.
It is year 1994 Jan.
The theatre is Sreekumar.(Trivandrum)
One 7th standard boy was sitting freezed by the horrific scenes where the dead dancer "Nagavalli"
took her bloody revenge.
Manichitratazh was history . And it was destroyed by the awful remake in tamil named "Chandramukhi". But truly, this one. Priyadarshan’s Bhool Bhulaiya is a gem.
*Bhool Bhulaiya
Language: Hindi
Story: Madhu Muttam
Script: Neeraj Vora
Direction: Priyadarshan
Music: Pritam Chakaraborty
Art Direction: Sabu Syril
Cinematography: Thiru
Cast: Vidya Balan, Akshay Kumar, Shiney Ahuja, Manoj Joshi, Amisha Patel, Rajpal Yadav, Paresh Rawal, Asrani etc.
Story & Direction
Priyadarshan has done full justice to the original script. Most of the classic scenes starting from the Paresh Rawal’s entry, the bath room scene of Akshay Kumar, the first scene where the dead dancer’s (In Hindi, Nagavalli became Manjulika) voice is heard and the shocking climax. everything is there.
The story is of a young couple(Shiney Ahuja and Vidya Balan)from US who comes to live in their ancetral Palace in Banaras. But the local folk including their relatives believe that it is a haunted mansion. The myth is of a dancer Manjulika from Bengal who was a cout dancer in the Palace during the reign of a womanizer king. The dancer was in love with a poet. And the king killed them.
Manjulika became a ghost and the family becomes cursed. She was locked 68 -years ago by a sorcerer, in a room in the third floor of the mansion where nobody dare to go.
Avni(Vidya balan) opens that door and strange things begin to happen. In the middle of the night you can listen "Aami je tomaar ." one woman singing in Bengali . And Avni’s sari catches fire. and the servants see one woman with long undone hair roaming somewhere in the mansion.
Sidharth(Shiney Ahuja) finally seeks help from his friend Aditya(Akshay Kumar) to find a solution for this drama.
He enters and finds out the chilling secret.
Performances
Akshay Kumar has done the lighter part of Dr. Aditya exactly with the same ease with which Mohan Lal once played the character.But towards the end, you cannot watch that subtle expressions of anxiety and frustration that Mohan Lal could bring out clinically . Paresh Rawal, Rajpal yadav and Shiney Ahuja were adequate. But Vidya Balan has done the role of her career. Watch the climax scenes .I never expected that she can come that closer to what Shobhana had done for Manichitratazh.
Manoj Joshi as the uncle is a revelation. He proved that he can do things other than comedy. Hats off to Priyadarshan for casting him in the role that once performed by Nedumudi Venu.
Technical side
Excellent camera by Thiru . Brilliant sets by Sabu Syril and enjoyable songs by Pritam.
What else can we expect? Of course fine direction by Priyadarshan.
Go and Watch this rare thriller that can happen only once in a blue moon!