Cast: Kajol & Sanjay Dutt
| Direction: Tanuja Chandra
| Rating: * * | |
|
Feel the heat. Hapless, breathless, luckless, a girl screams on the street. Her sister's being
attacked by a psycho fiend, but it's much too late to do a damn thing. Zing. Now that's quite a nail-biting moment in Dushman, produced by Pooja Bhatt and directed by debutante Tanuja Chandra. For a fair part of this slasher-thriller you're hurtled right to the edge of the seat. Neat. Indeed, during the first half, you're clasped in such a firm grip that you want to go hooray-hip-hip. A typhoonish tempo, compact scenes and a certain regard for the female characters elevate your spirits, which have been dampened incessantly by the dreadful doo-duh-dads hacked out at the movies in recent months. Quake. esult: You're even willing to ignore some shreds of the story which have been snagged from the Hollywood actioner, Eye For An Eye. And you might as well overlook the lingering hangover of Insaaf Ka Tarazu, besides those missing pieces in the jigsaw-like script (How a widow and her three daughters subsist in a cushy villa remains a mega-mystery.). Instead, your heart goes out to the duplicate darlings, Sonia and Naina (Kajol-Kajol). One is bouncy, the other's not. Mercifully, the contrasting personalities aren't grossly exaggerated, segueing effortlessly into a composite picture of a fatherless family. For once, the benign mum (a quietly impressive Tanvi Azmi) and the fuzzy-topped kid sister aren't podgy-pirouetting stereotypes. Next: The serial killer (Ashutosh Raina) commits his foul deed. Sonia's raped and hacked. Her twin sister's distraught, but is determined that the devil should get his due. A vulnerable figure, bicycling through alleyways, Naina literally stalks the killer from pillar to post-office. No tock-in-trade vendetta seeker, she pursues him with the fortitude of someone who has suffered a personal loss. But, alas and alack, as the story moves ahead, we're back to the standard gloss-n-floss. The latter half goes down like the Titanic, as if the plot had collided into a huge ice-bug. So, there you are assailed by a sinking feeling as the spunky Naina seeks the support of the nearest brawny male in sight. And hey, presto, a retired blind armyman (Sanjay Dutt) materialises out of thin air. Or should you say from the laser disc of Scent Of A Woman? Be that as it may, the dramaturgy becomes hopelessly repetitive (particularly those visits to the armyman's Swiss chalet). Some obligatory combat training exercises are hurriedly shot on the sunset-dappled shores of South Africa, no less! Moreover, the song interludes, surprisingly listlessly tuned by Dil To Uttam Singh Hai, seem as avoidable as a fly in tomato soup. Oops. Squirm in your seat, then, during the predictable gore-soaked finale, in which Naina slugs it out with Psycho - with plenty of muscular support from her armyman, of course. Psychodelic is outnumbered, depriving the gutsy heroine of her five minutes of fisticuff fame. Really, that's a shame. In the event, you're left with a surge of mixed feelings. What could have been a truly venturesome, woman-oriented drama degenerates into yet another yahoo-lahoo story. In addition, there are unpardonable errors. Like the seemingly bright kid sister, who has seen the killer in the courtroom, but still trots off merrily with him to the zoo. Oooh, was the cutie suddenly afflicted with amnesia? Never mind too much, though. Even with all its flaws, Tanuja Chandra's effort is superior to the Pyaar Kisises and Nafrat Kisises you've been subjected to lately. She does display sufficient potential, particularly in handling the performers. Of the cast, Sunjay Dutt is wasted in a half-baked role. Newcomer Jas Arora, as the murdered sister's beau, is strictly teakwood. On the other hand, Ashotosh Raina is terrific, oozing so much menace that he sends shivers up your spine. This stage-and-television artiste appears to be a born actor. However, Dushman is unthinkable without Kajol. The utterly natural actress often carries the burden of the entire enterprise on her capable shoulders. Sliding effortlessly into the diverse personalities of the two sisters, she delivers such a first-rate, emotionally walloping performance that your jaw drops in sheer amazement. Just for Kajol's pyrotechnics and flashes of assured direction, this otherwise inconsistent thriller is worth viewing. |
