Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past has no real scares, no real acting, no real sets, no real drama, no real crows and no real 3D effects, sighs Sreeju Sudhakaran.
Key Points
- People love getting scared. But in the case of Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past the first time the ghost shows his pasty CGI face in 3D, the audience was laughing.
- There is a one-armed guard in the mansion who appears to communicate exclusively in a high-pitched voice. I think that bothered the ghost quite a bit because there is a moment when the entity could have easily killed the hero, but he instead got rid of the second-most annoying character in the film.
- There were a couple of moments where the visuals froze completely. The actors stood still like wax statues while their dialogue carried on for a few seconds before the scene resumed. Honestly, with a film like this, I genuinely couldn’t tell if it was a technical glitch or a creative choice.
There is a scene in Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past where the cursed heroine asks the hero which year it is.
The hero answers, “2026.”
Chalo, good to know that its director, Vikram Bhatt, knows which year we are living in.
Because going by the quality of stuff he has been recently churning out in the name of ‘horror’, it feels like his filmmaking is regressing back to the time the heroine is perpetually stuck in: The 19th century.
Or by the fact that he still believes 3D is the gimmick that will draw in crowds.
But I was totally wrong in thinking so.
Or that was my first thought when I walked into a half-packed theatre on a Friday morning. I have seen bigger high-profile films on FDFS (first day first show for folks unfamiliar with the acronym) with fewer people in attendance.
So how is Vikram Bhatt pulling it off?
It didn’t take much time for me to solve the mystery.
We know audiences are suckers for horror. At the time of writing this review, the Hollywood horror hit Obsession is doing terrific box office business in India. People just love getting scared.
But in the case of Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past, the first time the ghost shows his pasty CGI face in 3D, the audience was laughing. It’s at that moment I realised the USP of this movie. It is not the boo-boos they are here for. It is the unintentional ha-has.
And for that, Haunted 3D: Echoes of the Past has plenty.
What’s Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past About?
The story revolves around Dev (Mimoh Chakraborty), a film director who is heartbroken after a betrayal and escapes Mumbai just before his film is about to release. He goes to a village called Maniktala and stays in a decrepit palace that seems to be beckoning him somehow.
The left wing of the palace lies in ruins while the right wing is mysteriously intact and barred, forbidding anyone from entering, during the day. Whoever tries to enter is trapped there forever or dies in a mysterious manner.
I guess Vikram Bhatt has something political to say here. Or perhaps I am reading too much into the cracks because I am waiting to be scared.
Well, it doesn’t take long for the spooks to arrive.
You see, this right wing only opens at night, and trapped within is a pretty girl named Sunehri (Chetna Pande), guarded by an evil spirit. The spirit is blind but can attack based on sound, and if it discovers that the girl is trying to escape, it drags her back and tortures her.
BTW, the excellence of the ghost’s hearing ability is completely dependent on whether the screenplay has backed itself into a corner.
In the beginning, the girl and the director talk under the cover of thunder or the sound of running water. Soon enough, even that is abandoned whenever they need to have proper conversations without interruptions.
Silly Storyline, Annoying Characters
Anyway, Dev figures out that Sunehri is trapped in time. Her section of the palace is stuck in the same day-and-night cycle in 1870. What’s more, the whole village slips back into the past every night.
He also learns that the only way to destroy the spirit and save her from the curse is by discovering the ghost’s backstory, which Sunehri herself cannot reveal.
The only catch is that if the ghost finds out you are trying to uncover his secret, he will kill you.
Look, that last part feels like a complicated situation, especially considering there is a raven shown eavesdropping on them in one scene.
But after a point, even Vikram Bhatt seems to realise he has tied too complicated a knot for his hero, so he untangles it with surprising ease.
Dev not only discovers the entire backstory (told through a strange Rajasthani folk song where every line ends with a ‘ooo’ sound), but also learns exactly how to destroy the spirit. So much for the complicated curse.
As for that eavesdropping raven, I guess Vikram Bhatt forgot about it.
Oh, I also forgot.
Dev has two friends.
One is a girl (Shruti Prakash) who studies historical ruins, so naturally her job is to drop exposition whenever required.
The other is a dude called Titu (Gaurav Bajpai), who just can’t stop questioning things.
First, he questions the hero’s decisions, then he questions the hero’s sanity, and eventually he questions the questions themselves.
There is one scene where Dev and his friends discover that the bridge they travelled across to reach the palace has disappeared overnight. Dev responds by saying that in a situation like this, sometimes the impossible becomes possible and that they travelled in the past where there was no bridge.
To which Titu says, ‘Okay, that’s fine, but how did that bridge disappear?’
Bro, if only you questioned why you are in this film with the same enthusiasm. Other than to fetch car-keys when the hero demands.
There is also a one-armed guard in the mansion who appears to communicate exclusively in a high-pitched voice. I think that also bothered the ghost quite a bit because there is a moment when the entity could have easily killed the hero, but he instead got rid of the second-most annoying character in the film.
The first, of course, is Titu.
The Missed Scare Opportunities in 3D
Look, I am not a huge fan of the horror genre, but I know that what makes a good horror film work is how real the scares feel to the audience.
And firstly, for that, the setting needs to feel believable, even if the paranormal doesn’t.
Vikram Bhatt’s earlier horror films like Raaz (2002) and 1920 (2008) were shot in convincing locations, which made the horror feel tangible.
Here, almost the entire film has been shot inside a cheap VFX studio, where the foreground, the background and even the underground look completely artificial. Combined with the abuse of AI-generated imagery, the movie becomes a disconcerting visual experience made even terrible with the 3D glasses on.
As for the scares, if you are someone who jumps out of your seat when an Instagram-generated demon face is suddenly slapped onto the screen in 3D, even then you won’t be satisfied. The film barely offers enough of those.
I am also still not sure whether this was my theatre projector acting up or the movie itself, but there were a couple of moments where the visuals froze completely.
The actors stood still like wax statues while their dialogue carried on for a few seconds before the scene resumed. Honestly, with a film like this, I genuinely couldn’t tell if it was a technical glitch or a creative choice.
So in conclusion, Haunted 3D: Echoes Of The Past has no real scares, no real acting, no real sets, no real supervision, no real drama, no real crows and no real 3D effects. What it does have, however, is an abundance of glorious schlock.
And just for that, Vikram Bhatt’s new film is paisa vasool.
