Chamunda (1999)

Two hundred years ago, Raja Pratap Singh ruled as Maharaja over his subjects, but his folk and his land were living in mortal fear as death stalked them in the guise of an evil spirit by the name of Saamri. The fear had spread like an epidemic among his people, rather than providing luxury for their lord.

One fine day Pratap Singh proceeds on an outing with his daughter Ragini when their royal carriage breaks down, and they are forced to shelter in the middle of nowhere. While his minions are busy repairing the carriage, Raja Sahib discovers that his daughter appears to have wandered off into the wilderness. He grows increasingly nervous as night begins to fall. One of his subjects informs the Maharaja that this area is Saamri’s hunting ground, at which point he orders them to search for his precious daughter. Soon enough, a tubby fellow wearing a black Primark overcoat and some rather crude white eye make-up arrives through billowing clouds of mist, cackling ominously as all evil men do. He then proceeds to strangle the Maharaja’s troupe one by one, displaying extraordinary superhuman strength as he lifts each victim off the ground while choking them, Michael Myers style.

Meanwhile, we see that Ragini has wandered into an old Haveli where she starts to explore, not knowing that Saamri is busy decimating her father’s entourage one by one and is homing in on the Haveli. Upon seeing the chubby marauder, Ragini passes out, Raja Sahib and his posse arrive in the nick of time just as Saamri is about to do something nasty to the poor child. A dreadful situation follows, with Saamri relishing the confrontation. Still, all of a sudden, his demeanour changes abruptly when a Trishul borrowed from the nearby Mandir is brandished in front of him.

Now the tables are turned, and the marauding Saamri is now whimpering like a helpless child in fear of the holy trident about to poke him and end his reign of terror. The Maharaja’s men surround him, and then the old priest at the Mandir arrives to inform the others that Saamri has been a naughty boy and needs to be punished. Saamri has been on a crime spree, raping women, killing children and drinking copious amounts of blood just for fun.
It is decided that Saamri should be decapitated in the vicinity of the Mandir and his head placed in a box which is placed in the storage room of the Mandir. But before his head is chopped off, Saamri curses the Maharaja, telling him that his family will never be able to flourish because any woman who attempts to bear a child will perish. Thus, his heritage will be ruined.

The Mandir wala Baba advises that to keep Saamri from rising from the dead and reclaiming his head, and to start another rampage, the Holy Trishul be placed alongside the box containing his severed head that should ensure safety from any untoward return from the grave.
Years passed, and most of Raja Pratap Singh’s family took to the city, but one of his lines decided to remain connected to the old grand style of living it up like a lord in the ancestral lands and his sister Shakuntala. He has a fine young daughter at college, where he thinks she is attending classes for education. Still, it turns out she is far busier being romanced by the local Romeo and singing disco numbers in the park at any given opportunity. Alas, her father discovers her dalliance and reacts violently, having the lad beaten up. Any attempt to stop the romance meets in failure. Finally, he pleads to the young man that “if you love my daughter, you will leave her well alone for her well-being”, and then he proceeds to explain about the curse put on the family by Saamri two hundred years ago as being the reason.

This is still not enough to deter his daughter. She insists that they go to the ill-fated Haveli where Saamri once lurked to prove that such curses are redundant in this modern age of science where silly superstitions will not get in the way of her having many babies with the love of her life. Soon, along with another couple, they will prove the whole Saamri curse a hoax and head off to the old Haveli, where soon enough, things start to go bump in the night.
The rest of the film is as predictable as anyone who has watched many z grade Bollywood horror trash well testify to.

A bunch of hideous disco dances in the garden sprinkled over a sauce reeking with staleness. It jogs along at a canter until eventually reaching its risible conclusion. Anil Nagrath is the best of a turgid lot, but Satnam Kaur delights with her ghastly performance and Raj Premi’s dreams of making it big didn’t quite materialize. One of the actors is the girl in Kanti Shah’s magnificent Dracula and though not given much scope, she still delivers her lines with misdirected verve. Somehow the atrocious, wooden but admirably enthusiastic acting, appalling lack of continuity and any shred of artistry work in the movie’s favour.

It’s all pretty dire with Saamri in his overcoat with white blotches as eyeliner, a sight for sore eyes but, there isn’t a rubber mask in the picture, nor is the film dogged by dreadful comedic sequences much to its benefit. Regardless it is a cut-price piece of crap that only die-hard fans of cinematic excrement can find joy. While not perhaps worth a second or third viewing as Dracula and Khooni Dracula and any film by Harinam Singh all are, this one is a piece of confounding garbage that still manages to stir the soul with its asinine formulaic rubbish.

Fortunately, both the YouTube version and the cut on VCD released by Moserbaer clock in at just about 78 minutes which is nearly as much as can be tolerated. Diabolical and dreadful stuff, but oddly, almost perversely enjoyable.