Feline Musings

We watched Bhootnath over the weekend, but I decided to wait for a couple of days to write an unbiased review. Though I have no qualms about saying that this 2-hr flick was entertaining in the first half, I still don’t feel confident about recommending the movie to someone. Maybe the easiest way out is to recommend renting a DVD.

The problem with Bollywood, off late, is weak scripts that try to pack all the punch in one go. And this issue is evident in Bhootnath also. The script is confused. One half of it is meant to endear to children, while the second half is a moral-lesson for the adults. The audience definition for this movie is faulty.

Hence, I suggest the home-watch – while Mom is preparing dinner and Papa signs off emails, the kiddos can enjoy the pranks of the child-bhoot combo, and then in the second half, Ma and Pa can take over for some Baghban style melodrama. In case the children are in their teens and you want them to understand the significance of shraad, mukti, their responsibility towards their parents and even forgiveness, then you may as well watch it as a family, Kleenex included.

The movie was made with good intentions and as a family entertainer. That’s why you don’t have any spooky stuff in a movie that’s about a ghost. The familiarity with Big B also subdues any offhand attempts to add fear-factor. In fact, the storyline also speaks about the movie’s good intentions. In ghost movies, like Bhoot, the weakest link is the climax, when the reason for a troubled soul haunting people or places is traced to rape or murder. However, Bhootnath gives a very social and practical twist to the tale. The concept of sudden death and unfulfilled desires, along with possessiveness for memories and a place are convincing, and go down well with the script and the audience.

It’s the moralistic approach and the long-winding episodes where Shahrukh suddenly comes into the picture to set everything right, that makes the movie unpersuasive. From convincing the dead man’s son to perform the shraad ceremony, to explaining his son about the meaning of mukti, Shahrukh Khan’s melodrama makes you squirm in your seats. And for once, while you appreciate the thought on the “empty-nest” syndrome, you really can’t blame the pre-teens whose free-flowing laughter in the first-half has turned into a barrage of questions directed towards their parents, as they wonder what happened to the childish Banku and his cherubic friend.

It’s a mixed bag and that’s why the reviews and even the box collections are mixed. From a sloppy start in the first week to higher collections, in the second, this movie may soon be forgotten. But the “To be continued ….” tagline makes me believe that Bhootnath and a teenaged Bankhu will return with intelligent and hilarious episodes sans their Moral Science books, and preferably sans a melodramatic Shahrukh Khan.

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