Priyadarshan’s latest Hindi venture feels like a mixed thali of the director’s own Bhool Bhulaiyaa 1 and Aamir Kaushik’s Stree movies. The physical humor is not for all, but a committed ensemble cast especially the veterans make it somewhat work. Akshay Kumar has a dual role one of a wastrel son and the other grey shaded character simmering with anger. Akshay makes a bigger impact in the second role. Among the three ladies Wamiqa Gabbi makes her presence felt in a mysterious character

Starcast: Akshay Kumar, Asrani, Paresh Rawal, Rajpal Yadav, Jisshu Sengupta, Rajesh Sharma, Wamiqa Gabbi, Mithila Parkar, Tabu and others

Genre: Horror/comedy

Direction and screenplay: Priyadarshan

Additional screenplay: Rohan Shankar and Abhilash Nair

Story: Aakash Kaushik

Dialogues: Rohan Shankar

Music: Pritam

Cinematography: Divakar Mani

Producers: Ekta Kapoor, Shoba Kapoor and Akshay Kumar

Production Companies: Balaji Motion Pictures, and Cape of Good Films

Running time: 2 hours and 45 minutes

In the last few years Horror comedies have emerged as a major recipe for success especially in Hindi Cinema. Whether its the Maddock horror universe Stree movies, Bhediya, Munjiya and Thamma. Or the Bhool Bhulaiyaa films. The combination of horror with laughs have been largely successful in entertaining the audience. At the same time an overkill has happened too with the largely familiar structure. Priyadarshan’s Bhoot Bangla feels like a spiritual sequel to his own movie Bhool Bhulaiyaa 1. The building up to the legend of Vadhasur and the progression of events have a major resemblance. Having said that Bhooth Bangla does a fair job in mixing slapstick humor with a well written origin story. An important flashback in mid second half has a good emotional touch.

Bhooth Bangla’s story in brief revolves around Akshay Kumar’s Arjun Maurya. He travels to an eerie place called Mangalpur, Arjun has ancestral palace. Mangalpur has a scary legend of a monster called Vadhasur. The marriage of Arjun Maurya’s sister played by Mithila Parkar is supposed to happen in these haunted surroundings. Arjun Maurya is casually dismissive of Vadhasur calling it as a cock and bull story. But he gradually realizes that Vadhasur is no myth. Unfortunately, the sister’s wedding has to happen here only, it has been destined by the high priest of the groom’s family. The rest of the story focuses on how Arjun Maurya saves the day with some help. Running parallel to this is Wamiqa Gabbi’s Priya in search of her loved one.

A strong aspect of Bhooth Bangla is Vadhasur’s origin story. The use of mythology here as the man born out of a union between an asura and deva has been well staged. The CGI effects are of a good order coupled with the cinematography of Divakar Mani. Mention must also be made of Akshay’s second role in a key flashback. His simmering anger and a feeling of being betrayed his own father has been brought out wonderfully by the actor. In one way this track is reminiscent of Christopher Marlowe’s novel Dr Faustus. How in a heated moment of insecurity the character Madhav sells his soul to Vadhasur for getting the woman he loves has been well written and enacted.

The first half is mostly devoted to scenes of slapstick comedy with major focus on physical humor. The portions of Rajpal Yadav as an electrician often border on farcical humor, he is slapped on more than one occasion by Akshay Kumar. Similarly, Paresh Rawal as the wedding organizer has a running joke on his bum being attacked. These scenes are deliberately low brow in nature, but Priyadarshan’s usual quartet of actors embrace these portions whole heartedly and are successful in raising some chuckles. Late Asrani has a substantial role too. More so in the first half. His scenes with Akshay have a fun tonality as well making the viewers chuckle.

The track between Akshay Kumar and Wamiqa Gabbi also has some interesting touches. Wamiqa lights up the screen the screen whenever she is there and the twist of a twin comes in the right time. Jisshu Sengupta as Akshay Kumar’s father may seem like an odd casting choice, but Jisshu does a fine job especially in the second half. Rajesh Sharma has an important role too. His act of desperate father comes with negative/grey shades much like Akshay’s Madhav and the actor does a very fine job.

Tabu comes in mid second half lending grace to an underwritten part. She looks like a dream though in the dance sequence. Mithila Parkar as the love-struck sister is good in the limited screen time.

A major problem with Bhooth Bangla is a significant hangover of the above-mentioned movies. The viewers get a major deja vu especially for the ones who have seen Bhool Bhulaiyaa and Stree, a more original approach was needed. Pritam’s songs also leave something to be desired. They are not bad per se but given the general track record of Pritam the tunes could have been much better.

Another problem is the scene of toilet humor; it reeks of very bad taste leaving a bitter after taste. Lastly the second half needed some trimming to make the film crisper.

Final word: Bhooth Bangla is a nostalgic horror comedy best watched with moderate expectations.