Review :-
Ayesha (Swara Bhaskar) and Uday (Bhanu Uday) relocate to Jabalpur from Mumbai after Uday takes up a job there. They are put up at a spacious guest house in a deserted location. In no time, Ayesha senses a mysterious presence in the house. Nightmares, hallucinations, creepy noises, paranormal occurrences and shadows start plaguing her. Scared for her family, she pleads her husband to vacate the house but he blames it on her mind games. What’s the truth?
Novelty cannot be expected much in horror, given the nature of the genre. But if the cliched scenes manage to scare you, the job is done. Machhli Jal Ki Rani Hai has a formulaic premise too – a woman alone in a haunted house, doors shutting by themselves, mysterious gory deaths, ‘I-believe-in-ghosts’ maid and an exorcism in the climax. While the film has incorporated all the elements possible, it struggles to maintain tension. The focus diverts from ghost presence and possession to the couple hosting dinner parties for their friends. Inclusion of other insignificant characters adds to the length and take away from the content, thus weakening the plot. Sound effects are strictly average.
While Swara Bhaskar is impressive in her first horror film, her performance fails to compensate the director’s disjointed execution. Bhanu Uday is decent too.
If you get spooked easily, you may not mind this one. If you like horror, watch Insidious (2010) or Ram Gopal Varma’s Bhoot (2003) again. Those are classics.
Story :-
A housewife experiences paranormal activities in her new house. Are those occurrences a figment of her imagination or do they happen for real?
The Times of India
