Desi Slashers

The other day, on a lazy Sunday afternoon, I was hunting for a DVD to see. Rummaging in my shelves, I came across a DVD called Ssshhh.. starring Kajol’s younger sister Tanisha and Dino Morea, directed by Pavan Kaul. It was still sealed in its packet, so clearly no one in the house had ever wanted to see it! On an impulse I took it out and watched it. (Has anyone else in the world seen it?)

It’s a text book slasher film that looks suspiciously like Scream. Tanisha is a young college girl whose sister is brutally murdered. She herself gets stalked by the killer who always appears in a sort of long black coat, black trousers and a clown mask. Tanisha is absolutely traumatized and her college friends decide to take her to Bangkok for a holiday. They end up in a deserted island there. Meanwhile, Tanisha’s mother, back home in India, is also killed by the masked killer. And then, everyone on the deserted island starts getting killed one by one. Finally, in the climax, the killer’s identity is revealed.

It’s the kind of film where you can predict exactly when the killer will appear, when he won’t, when it’ll be a false alarm etc.

But you know what? Many of the sequences were actually executed quite competently. (The locations are lovely: the first part of the film is shot in Manali and the second part in a beautiful, idyllic island). The shots were nicely framed, the background music was not bad, and the director did manage to build tension — even though it was so predictable. (Eg: whenever Tanisha is left alone, whether it’s at home or in the college restroom, you know the killer will appear). Also – a plus point – you were quite confused as to who the killer could be (at least I was!)

However, every time the director moved away from the real story – of the killer terrorizing Tanisha and other people – the film just fell apart. All the songs, the mandatory love angle, the college banter made large parts of the film extremely boring.

But even the killer track didn’t work finally, mainly because the film was such a ‘classic’ slasher film, and so heavily derived from Hollywood films such as Scream. You felt you were watching something you’ve seen many, many times before. (Only the characters and settings were Indian — and of course, the usual Bollywood touches – like a Punjabi night in a Bangkok hotel! The perfect excuse to have some naach gaana). No wonder the film came and went and no one even remembers it.

So why? I mean, I don’t think the director is without talent. I just kept wondering why he had made this film.

Whenever we copy Hollywood genres faithfully (I’m discounting the Bollywood touches), the result is always so disappointing. As it is, slasher films are formulaic even in the West and always slotted as B grade. Why attempt that kind of genre here?

But why single out poor Pavan Kaul? I haven’t seen the recent Bollywood horror films – Vikram Bhatt’s Shaapit or Ramgopal Varma’s Phoonk or any of the others – but from what I’ve heard and read, none of them make the cut as original movies. (Either the killer is a bhoot or he/she is a crazed psychotic serial killer. The basic format remains the same).

Is there no original, Indian way to make this kind of film? Since it’s such a popular Hollywood format, are we doomed to constantly look there for inspiration?