Jo dar gaya…

There’s been a drought of Bollywood movies. So acute, I’ve even had to watch Shaadi se pehle because there was nothing else. This week, after quite a while, first day matinee of Darna zaroori hai. I’d watched Darna mana hai and it wasn’t half bad, so I reckoned I could deal with the next in the series. Not bad, I tell you, not at all bad.

Portmanteau film. About half a dozen short horror/thriller stories strung together in some sort of loose (and rather pointless) narrative. Different writers and directors for each short story, and that was the chief attraction for me. To see how directors Sajid Khan, Prawaal Raman (who made the predecessor), Jijy Philip, Manish Gupta, JD Chekravarthy and Ram Gopal Verma handled the shorts. Disappointing, as far as that goes. The segments weren’t as different or characteristic as I hoped – too much RGV looming over each for them to be in any way distinct.

Good performances, though. All of them. I particularly liked the segment Chekravarthy directed – the only one that actually had people chuckle. He managed to create, in twenty odd minutes, characters that engaged us. I think I’ll also remember the one with Mallika Sherawat and Anil Kapoor.

Horror wise? Was I scared? Nah, like a lion I was. I had the forethought to equip myself with a packet of fryums. This superb strategy has its roots in the funda that having your hands engaged in some activity helps detach emotionally from what’s happening around you (therefore smokers and the lady who knitted as heads rolled at the guillotine).

I must share with you the fruits of my research: fryums are boring. They’re shaped like a wheel with many spokes and everything, and I thought at first that they offered much scope for infinite observation but all this peters out very quickly. Limited things. Taste horrible too. Should’ve taken in the gold fingers.