13B

I have to clear one misconception first – though this movie is marketed as a horror movie, it is not. It’s a good suspense thriller with supernatural overtones. The good kind which makes you feel satisfied after coming out of the theatre – instead of the usual ‘plot hole’ discussions that follow every hindi thriller movie.

The movie has Madhavan playing Manohar, a civil engineer who along with his extended family, have just shifted into a apartment 13B of a new building. Things seem very saas-bahuish with Poonam Dhillon playing Manohar’s mother, Neetu Chandra playing his wife and a Vidya-Balan-lookalike playing his bhabhi. The K-serial theme follows as we are treated to their daily chores of getting ready for work and school/college in the morning before the saas and the bahus settle down to watch their daily serials.

However, there are small incidents that tell you that things are not quite right. Camera photos come out weird and the lift just refuses to work when Madhavan is in the lift alone. There is also a creepy looking blind man with a guard dog, who is their next-door neighbour and for some reason reminds me of Sudhir Mishra, the director.

However, these intriguing happenings are interspersed with family events, and some lame-assed romance between Madhavan and Neetu Chandra – including two ill conceived songs which should never have been there. The pace tends to flag a little when these things come, but the director is quick to yank our attention back to the sinister happenings – like the blind-guard-dog refusing to enter the house and the milk getting spoilt each and every day.

Meanwhile, all these events are noticed only by Madhavan – for reasons not explained – the others do not seem to notice anything funny. Especially when the women of the house are captivated by a new serial called Sab Khairiyat which features a joint family moving to a new house – and which appropriately comes at 1:00 pm (13:00 hrs) on channel number 13 !! Only Madhavan picks up the similarities between their life and the show – and realizes that the show foretells what will happen to his family (which makes us question the collective intelligence of the women of the house [snigger] )

The premise is intriguing and the director exploits this idea intelligently. There is no ‘ghost entering someone’s body’ crap and the story is peeled back layer by layer, leaving us curious to know more. The second half of the movie is paced much better as there is no time spent on joint family theatrics. Things have a sense of urgency as Madhavan races against time to uncover the mystery.

So far so good. Now time to point out things that are not so kosher.

One – the director has taken pains to highlight each weird happening or incident, by playing a music crescendo and lingering the camera on the object. While this is ok a few times, the audience is not so dimwitted that they have to be guided to the mystery EVERY time with helpful music and camera !! Credit the audience with some intelligence !!

Second – I went to the movie expecting to be scared. However there was nothing which was scary – spooky, maybe yes. But not scary. Which was kind of disappointing. When can we hope to get a real scare-the-shit-out-of-people hindi movie ???
Debutante director Vikram Kumar makes an intelligent beginning by putting the idea of the supernatural into something daily-life like a tv. For a film industry that is stuck on to the idea of bhoot banglas, it is a good step. The script shows intelligence and doesn’t have any significant plot holes. Acting by Madhavan is pretty good and the suspense doesn’t let up till the end.

The climax though, is a bit underwhelming. Because the movie adheres to the unwritten rule that the killer has to be one of the characters that has already been introduced, it fails to capitalize on the originality of the film’s premise. And the last scene with the phone was just very lame. So a middle rating for 13B