Roohi

Hardik was a script supervisor on Vikramaditya Motwane's Lootera and Trapped. He's made the terrific National Award-winning documentary Amdavad Ma Famous. His first feature Kaamyaab, was such a winning ode to the Hindi film sidekick that Shah Rukh Khan came on board as a co-producer. Roohi seemed like a solid next step - a bigger budget, A-list stars and a world that had already been successfully set up by director Amar Kaushik and writers Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK in Stree. This had the potential to be all sorts of sparkling. Instead, Hardik's distinct sensibility has been flattened out by a film that wants to juggle many balls - horror, comedy, feminist messaging, a love triangle, a bromance - but ends up dropping almost all of them.

There are two competing forces within Roohi. One is a conventional and schlocky horror show in which superstition is embraced, witches abound and scares are accompanied by loud sound effects. The other is a wild and unorthodox tale with metaphorical possibilities, in which an unusual love triangle unfolds between a pair of friends and a possessed woman.

Set somewhere in Uttar Pradesh two buddies Bhawra (Rajkummar Rao) and Kattanni (Varun Sharma) are part of the groom kidnapping (Pakaruah shaadi / Jabaria shaadi) gang led by Guniya Shakeel (Manav Vij). One day they get the assignment to kidnap Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor). Circumstances forced Bhawra and Kattanni to keep Roohi at a safe place amidst the jungle for a few days. Strange, weird and scary things start happening. What happens next.

Somewhere in the deep, dark recesses of Roohi's screenplay, is a feminist flick waiting to be exorcised from the body it is trapped in. But writers Mrighdeep Singh Lamba (who earlier directed Fukrey and Fukrey Returns) and Gautam Mehra take so long to get to the point they wish to make, walking us through a long and convoluted plot along the way, that their subversive intent is completely lost.

ROOHI is the story of a possessed girl. Bhawra Pandey (Rajkummar Rao) and Kattanni Qureshi (Varun Sharma) work as crime journalists in a small town, Baagadpur. They also specialise in 'pakdaai shaadi' aka bride kidnapping, an accepted custom in Baagadpur. One day, their boss, Guniya Shakeel (Manav Vij) orders them to kidnap a girl, Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor), from a nearby town, Mujaribaad. Bhawra and Kattanni manage to kidnap Roohi while she is with her father (Rajesh Jais).

Small towns, supernatural myths and a silly set of men entangled around a seemingly spooky woman -- Roohi's eagerness to capitalize on Stree's success is as obvious as it is regrettable. Producer to both, Dinesh Vijan aspires for a horror comedy universe around these keywords but Roohi, previously titled Rooh Afza followed by Roohi Afzana can neither match the wacky vision nor the feministic vigour of Stree.

The story starts with the montage of footage shot by an American reporter, who then is invited to shoot the village Bagadpur's tradition - bridenapping (or as said, 'pakdai shaadi' in the film). Bhawra Pandey (Rajkummar Rao) and Kattani Qureshi (Varun Sharma) are professional bridenappers until they are asked to abduct Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor). A pro tip: When your father is carrying two of your pictures to describe your looks to the police, telling them, "Kabhi kabhi yeh aisi bhi dikhti hai," you definitely need to replace your father.

In and around Bagadpur, which has people speaking several dialects, there's a tradition of 'pakdai byah' (bride kidnapping). Bhawra Pandey (Rajkummar Rao) and Katanni (Varun Sharma) are among the contract goons who get such weddings done. The twist in the tale comes when they abduct a possessed girl Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor) and then fall in love with her as Sharma hilariously calls it 'the exercise of imlie'.

After Amar Kaushik's 2018 film Stree emerged winner at the box office, and set new benchmark for horror comedies in Bollywood, it was to expect that the second offering from the same production should at least be equally good, if not better. Sadly, the latest release in the genre, Roohi, starring Janhvi Kapoor, Rajkummar Rao and Varun Sharm, is a rather drab attempt at trying to scare people while making them laugh. Neither of the two click.

A wild, weird goulash of heavy-handed hinterland hocus-pocus, perplexing pop psychology and dashes of broad humour pressed into the service of a horror-comedy, Roohi, helmed by Hardik Mehta, is a film whose ambitions far outstrip its output. That is not to say that the screenplay is completely devoid of flashes of inspiration but these bright spots are not strong enough to withstand self-indulgent genre excess.

Two small-town boys, Bhaura Pandey (Rajkummar Rao) and Kattanni Qureshi (Varun Sharma), are stuck with Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor) under strange circumstances. She seems to be a simple, demure girl, but they soon realise that she has another side to her her "ghostly" personality, Afza. Bhaura develops feeling for Roohi, and Kattanni falls for Afza. With a strange romance brewing between the trio, Bhaura wants to get rid of Afza, while Kattani wants to make sure she lives on so that he can romance her.

In the 2018 'Stree', Bollywood gave us A Ghost Who Walks, her twisted 'ultey' feet leaving tracks of gleeful subversion in the small town she haunts. A few hiccups notwithstanding, 'Stree' was a sharp feminist comment on the age-old fear of strong, desirous women. With the same producer and lead actor toplining 'Roohi', this week's new release in theatres, I was hoping for an encore. Sadly, the Dinesh Vijan-Rajkummar Rao's horror comedy is just plain horrible, with not one laugh in sight.