Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3 Movie Review — Sucharita Tyagi
Doing “research” and writing about any Bhool Bhulaiyaa sequel is mostly just an excuse to watch Vidya Balan and Vineeth Radhakrishnan dance on loop for about 3 hours.
Iss baar original Malayalam film se Shobhana ji ke dance tak bhi pohonch gayi.
Jaana pada. Kyunki yeh nahi BB 3 dekh kar itch scratch hui nahi hai.
Shuruat hoti hai 1824 ke Bengal se. Shreya Ghoshaal ki awaaz goonj rahi hai, ek mahila naach rahi hain not knowing ki Mughal-e-azam style yeh aakhiri dance hone waala hai, raja ji is unhappy. The dancing woman is dragged away and burnt alive in front of a bunch of people, aur jaisa ki chudailon ki lore se humein gyaat hai, yahaan kahaani shuru hoti hai. The legend of Monjolika, the singing-dancing, the heart-broken ghost is born.
Cut to the present day. The lead character Ruhaan once again is Rooh Baba, joh religious andh-vishwaasi logo ka faayda uthaa kar, bhoot-pret bhagaane ka naatak karta hai, earning his livelihood comfortably. Will he be as cool when he comes face to face with asli pishachini, ya saare smarts dhare ke dhare reh jaayenge?
Indian Chudailon ke legends are fascinating, kyunki through the stories of these vengeful half women half demons, a writer is almost always telling a feminist tale. Women come back with an uncontrollable anger, to claim what was taken from them. In a few days ek interview upload kar rahi hoon writer-director Anvita Dutt ke saath, who made Bulbull with Triptii Dimri, and how she crafted her chudail, kaafi insightful. Toh chahe Anvita ho, Raj and DK with Stree, Farah Khan ki Om Shanti Om, all the way back to 1949 with the OG Kamal Amrohi ki Mahal starring Madhubala, the film that gave this genre in Hindi cinema the shape it holds today, harr haunting mein essence hai female desire ka, lambi chaudi khaali haveli becoming the physical embodiment of a woman’s empty life, with darkness she has come back to explore, or lurk within.
Writer Aakash Kaushik joh pichle reboot mein 2004 tak hi gaye they, iss baar 1800s mein jaakar aur gehraayi se khojne ki koshish mein hain ki chudailon ki kahaaniyan kyun hoti hain. Isske jawaab tak jaane mein, by way of Anees Baazmee and Kartik Aaryan, is…a choice. Anees Baazmee ek bohot specific style of Bollywood slapstick comedy ke expert hain, most of his films feature characters engaged in broad physical humor running, falling, shoving, hitting each other, putting the slap in slapstick, the pinnacle arguably being 2007’s Welcome. Women in his stories usually supplement the main hero’s plans by showing up for him when convenient. They are either the joke, or the beautiful lady the hero must marry.
Kartik Aaryan, who has worked his way to the top has experimented with genres — drama, thriller, social justice, romance, but his biggest successes have been movies where women again get a raw deal — Sonu Ke Titu, Pyaar ka Punchnama. Over the last few years, the actor has drifted away from this and mercifully toward films that don’t rely on punching down at women, while still remaining stories of a man who wins. Chandu Champion, Satyaprem ki katha, and his biggest hit Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 he made with Anees Bazmee.
However, capturing lightning a second time is just as hard as has been foretold.
Vidya Balan ke waapas aane ke baavjood, WITH the added bonus of a Madhuri Dixit, Bhool Bhulaiyya 3 feels like it’s being force fed down our throats because it would be foolhardy not to get a sequel greenlit, considering the money the last one earned.
The year 1824 seemingly is only chosen because it is 200 saal pehle from 2024, aur sun ne mein 200 saal accha lagta hai I suppose. Chudail origin story ko ek nayi layer dene ke liye lekhak Aakash Kaushik tick mark karke thoda social angle yahaan, aur thoda wahaan lekar, complex banana ki koshish mein end goal tak pohonchne se pehle 10 alag dishaaon mein mud jaate hain. There is an attempt to draw a comparison between how men are able to get away with lying and cheating vs if women attempt to do it they have pay to pay a much heavier price. Why does Anjulika have to pay for what Monjolika did? Is Triptii Dimri also possessed? Plenty of red herrings are thrown about, few of which achieve the goal of diverting your suspicions. However its all too muddled and unstructured to have any sort of lasting impact, or even give you much to think about. The biggest offenders are the “comic relief” characters, played by Sanjay Misra, Rajpal Yadav and Ashwini Kalsekar. Acting greats, made to fall over each other and pull faces through the film. Other gags seem half baked as well. For instance — Walking into an old dilapidated haveli and seeing a bunch of “royals” trying to squeeze the last bits of toothpaste from a tube in and of itself is a funny way to express the decline of the institution and the foolhardiness of those who hold onto a long lost grandeur. But to see them brush their teeth collectively as a family sitting on the living couch for no discernible reason only screams hastily written scene, shot quickly ki bathroom ka set nahi lagega bas ab.
Right from the opening shot with the veiled dancing lady, I kept waiting for the Monjolika x Monjolika dance off the promotional material had promised. Despite Vidya Balan’s tragically altered body size to show de-aging, it is a DELIGHT to watch the two actors slay, doing Bharatnatyam and Kathak choreographed by Chinni Prakash. However Anees Bazmee and his editor Sanjay Sankla don’t allow it to become a seamless, artistic experience one can revel in, its all in too much of a hurry. Its depressing to think even with Madhuri and Vidya on screen, dancing to Shreya Ghoshal and Pritam, a song video needs to be made palatable like so.
Jitne jump scares hain, utne hi aapko screenplay mein tonal jumps bhi milenge. If youre the kind of person who wants everything all together, toh one song in Ladakh will come back to a haunting scene which will go to a scene with two pandits and one panditaayin either doing jhaadoo pocha or being haunted by a dead businessman or putting magic oil in their hair, randomly and hap-hazardly inserted in between actual plot points. Its not enough to see the hero drive hie car out of the haunted haveli only to be magically brought back to the same spot 4 or 5 times, one must ALSO see the supporting actors go through the same thing, repeat the same sequence. Why?
Actual plot points ke baare mein zyada detail mein jaa nahi sakte without giving much away, but I will say as per usual, once again Kartik Aaryan has put his whole being into this film. There is a stiffness to his body language though, that had gone away in Chandu Champion, but has made an unfortunate re-appearance here, especially during scenes that rely heavily on dialogue. And that wig isn’t helping. You’ll see. A new version of Aami Je Tomar, sung by Sonu Nigam, picturized on the actor strays SO comically far from the tone of the conflict underneath it, it makes you wonder if we’ve forgotten the art of Bollywood playback music.
An angry Vidya Balan out for revenge is one of my favorite Bollywood sub-genres, if only the film had allowed her to lean into it a bit more. We don’t talk enough about the way her face has the capability to go from Raudra to Karuna in a matter of 2 seconds. I also wait patiently for the day someone gives Madhuri Dixit a part where she is allowed to go fully unhinged, not just as a barely actualized, half written, after thought. Both these women are in their professional prime, and while im glad we’re getting to see them regularly, it still isn’t quite enough, is it.
By the time Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3’s desired commentary becomes clearer and you begin to appreciate what the film was going for, it’s a little too late, the incessant unfunny jokes have worn you down. Rajpal Yadav does a Shahrukh Khan, actors reference their own films, Tripti Dimri looks amazing, familiar ting ding tiding riff plays throughout. Little of this is doing anything new, or adding to the pay-off of the horror-comedy genre. If youre a fan of familiarity though, this might work for you.
So, on a scale of 1 to 10, Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3 is….100 points to anyone who can explain here in the comments why Bengali children, dressed in Bengali clothes, celebrating a Bengali event IN BENGAL are singing and dancing to Hukkus Bukkus, a Kashmiri traditional song. National integration ki liye toh kisi ka dil nahi ro raha hai yahaan, samajh mein aaye toh bataana.
=
