Maut ki Dahshat (2004)

I first encountered Maut Ki Dahshat over a decade ago and found it mesmerizing for various reasons. The plot is not particularly novel, with the theme involving secret potions that promise eternal youth but those of us who know our horror movies (Wasp Woman, Countess Dracula, Rejuvenator, among many) also know that these potions always lead to mayhem and disaster. Maut Ki Dahshat remained burned into the memory due to the fabulous deadpan dialogues that were brilliant enough to be inducted into the ridiculously concocted “Mondo Bizarro” radio shows recorded in those days for The City FM89 broadcast to the unsuspecting world.

“Aik Bandar ne aisi harkat ki?” asks Inspector Rekha with the higher authorities breathing down her neck to solve the rape of a young woman at the hands of a man who appeared to resemble an Ape!

It transpires that the potion of Eternal “male potency” has the power to morph an ordinary healthy man into a hulking beast with superhuman powers and a sexual appetite to match. Unfortunately, there are side effects, and the dose also tends to cause excessive hairiness and a distinctly Ape-like appearance. In the opening introductory scenes young daughter of the famed scientist, Vipin Rai is Seema, is ravaged one night, but her cries of distress are noticed, and she is saved just in time from the filthy clutches of the rubbery Ape on a sex rampage.

While Seema’s family comes to terms with her attack, the brilliant Inspector Rekha slowly unravels the mystery. But not before several women have been attacked, groped at length and occasionally raped by the Horrible Hairy Thing in his spree of wanton crime and violence.

At the very outset, we are shown a healthy youth take the lotion and sprout tufts of hair at an alarming rate. In just seconds, the fit young lad is transformed from an average young man into a deranged gorilla with a sex drive that is off the charts, and he stalks the city for new victims to ravage. It’s a terrible situation, and the entire city is mortified for their mothers, wives and daughters as Inspector Rekha battles against time to stop the serial rapist-murderer before the death toll mounts any further.
Alas, there is no stopping the Rubbery Ape with a severe case of slack jaw, and a bevvy of beauties are attacked and rubbed and groped to death. And in a breathtaking, almost Hitchcockian twist, our likely heroine is also horrendously pressed to death by the said Rubbery Ape, which then leaves matters in the hands of the dashing Inspector Khan.

Meanwhile, it seems as though the Ape has a particular fascination with Scientist Vipin Rai’s daughter Seema who he returns to torment repeatedly. You remember Vipin Rai is the potion creator that allows men to retain their masculinity, virility and physique for a lifetime….it is also a potion that halts gay “issues” and helps a man remain a “true man”.

Vipin Rai’s formula is also protected fiercely protected by his protégé Ajay who has helped his scientist mentor working tirelessly on the serum for years. But who could have stolen the formula that has now turned a supposedly law-abiding young man into a marauding sex-mad Rubber Ape? Soon it dawns on the police that the thief of the procedure must also be the serial killer and rapist.
After several more deaths, all without one drop of blood in sight (the victims are rubbed and pressed to death), slowly, the case starts to crack. In the climactic scenes, finally, the identity of the Ape is revealed as the effects of the potion runs out, and he resorts to human form.

It’s a riotously awful film relying primarily on a man in a rubber suit for any of the misplaced horrors it may have to offer. Still, the story’s moral redeems it perfectly. The moral being that if you use unnatural substances to try to retain your youth, vanity and virility, things are bound to go awry, and you will soon turn into a Psychotic sex-starved Rubber Ape with a displaced jaw. If you take substances to increase your masculinity, physique, and strength, it will eventually rebound on you with deadly results.

Maut Ki Dahshat is a searing critique of “cosmetic surgery” and steroid use. It ought to be watched the world over especially screened at gyms where the youth are all readily injecting themselves and popping all sorts of substances which one day might turn them into a Killer Rubber Ape. The world needs more socially relevant horror such as Maut Ki Dahshat, a triumph for producer-director J. Neelam.

Amazingly entire songs have been lifted from other movies. Asha Bhosle’s incredible sizzling cabaret number from Johnny Mera Naam makes a complete appearance and is possibly the most enjoyable part of the movie. Plenty of Ape attacks to keep horror hounds satisfied, not nearly enough nudity for the typical cheap trash horror flick, but then the dose of morality adds some gravitas to a surreal situation. Some of the drunken comedy sequences are the stuff of true horror, and if you make it to the end, you should commend yourself on considerable reserves of determination. A potent indictment of the horrors of steroids and “aesthetic” surgery. A relevant and topical film.