Qatil Chudail (2001)

Qatil Chudail is another feather in director Kanti Lal’s ever-impressive cap.  The film is shot on a zero budget with the usual Z grade horror movie stars sharing screen space and time.  We begin with Anil Nagrath and his date heading off in the wee hours and the middle of the night when a nasty storm brews up. There is much stock footage of lightning bolts, the same we have seen since the early days of the Ramsays (including the same background music used for all horror movies since the late 70s). 

The thunder and lightning and the intimidating and empty Haveli they arrive at send Nagrath into a bit of a frenzy, and he starts hallucinating and freaking visualizing things moving around on their own and a witch laughing mockingly at him.  He is about to go into cardiac arrest when he is reassured by his lady friend, who then starts to turn up the party and raise the heat.  They have mad, passionate sex. We see that Nagrath has calmed down considerably enough to tell his friend of a previous occasion that he brought a floozy to this Haveli with horrifying consequences. 

It seems he had landed another hot and willing date. When they got to the Haveli, she started lusting in a fantastic manner after he kneaded and plucked at her bosom with considerable expertise.  Soon she is writhing on the bed, yearning for his touch, and he can hardly believe his lucky stars, but things go wrong. Soon enough, he comes face to face with an evil ghost with a hideously scarred and charred face who leers at him, cackling most evilly a bit like the possessed demons from The Evil Dead. 

The plot moves on to more Nympho-maniacal antics with Thakur Saab telling his daughter that he is off to the city for work, and though she claims to be distraught at his departure, she has other plans.  She contacts a sleazy friend of hers who tells her how wonderful it is to “be feeling love” from a man and gives her mate a number of a bodybuilder visiting from abroad. She gives in to her lusting ways, and soon she is telling her new friend how he has given her so much love that she can’t do without it and that he should sneak back into her home for continued passionate lovemaking while daddy is away. 

The situation gets out of hand as her lover is shot dead. But not before she has already made moves on her servant and her brother in law.  Daddy, realizing his daughter is a bad one, takes a rifle to her lover and her.  But it’s not long before they are both back from the dead to deliver the most horrible revenge on anyone who dared to interfere with Sapna’s insatiable sex drive.

One death sequence, in particular, might well have been inspired by The Evil Dead films again as a mounted Moose’s Head starts to come alive and attack its victim, goring him to an appalling end.  The Cackling witch face keeps returning intermittently though clearly all her footage was shot in one go and dispersed liberally and judiciously by maestro Kanti Shah.  Kamini, the evil wench, prowls the wilderness that surrounds the Haveli seeking out her fresh victims and uses her stunningly seductive ways as the perfect trap.  Later in seeking revenge from the Thakur, she uses his young daughter and possesses the child with her demonic spirit.  She plans to destroy the entire family, including the wife and children.  Bindiya, the child, is transformed into a deadly pawn, ready to plot the demise of her beloved parents. 

There is a welcome major twist at the three-quarter phase when it is revealed that the Thakurs saintly sister is anything but an angel as she is plotting with some goons to have the Thakur and his family wiped out. She dreams of gaining the family inheritance for herself.  With this spanner in the works, things are set up intriguingly for Kanti Shah to steer his plot deftly to a thrilling conclusion.

It’s a pretty bad cinematic experience, yet it somehow manages to hold together and not fall apart when expected, which is quite an achievement.  Sapna is in top form in a double role as the witch and her living and lusting twin sister while the other actors manage their roles with vigour.

The groping bits in the opening scenes were strong enough to be excised from the YouTube version, but the VCD version contains all the kneading, plucking and pressing in full glory.  Not for the faint-hearted or inexperienced but more for hardened Bollywood Horror watchers who have seen it all a dozen times before! Moral of the story?  Install nanny cams if you think you have a crazed, drooling nymphomaniac as a daughter.  It may help avoid some terrible circumstances.  Also, avoid sisters who appear overly sweet for their nefarious reasons.