Mahakaal the Monster (1993)
Directed by Shyam Ramsay
Tulsi Ramsay
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This movie should be called Freddy Goes to India. Before I get started I want to make something clear. While I consider myself a movie buff and I'm well versed in the horror world, I don't know squat about Bollywood. This film could be golden overseas. But frankly, this movie makes Freddy's Dead look like Citizen Kane. All this being said, I will repeat myself; I am blissfully ignorant in the ways of Bollywood and do not mean to offend. I am simply an American male watching a Hindu rip off of an American film.

Mahakaal (MUH-HA-KU-CALL) the Monster is a story about a sorcerer named Shakaal who uses black magic and sacrifices children for reasons unknown. Shakaal is caught red-handed about to sacrifice Mohini, the daughter of a police officer. He beats Shakaal nearly to death and buries him alive. Now, Shakaal is coming to his older daughter Anita (Hindu Nancy) in her dreams. One by one, he kills her friends and makes her crazy until he is ultimately defeated by Prakash (Hindu Glenn), who despite being the love interest to Anita, might be her cousin too. I could never quite figure it out.

I watched this film with my cat Max, who literally will watch TV with my wife and I. Midway through the film, Max left me alone to watch this thing. So basically, a cat had better things to do with his Friday night. The film eventually got so bad, he took a crap in his litter box that was so bad, I was forced to hit the PAUSE button and clean the litter box. He was trying to save me from this mess of a film!

'What makes this movie so bad Chris?' you might ask.

Well during the in between time (ie, time that was not being filled with a plot). We were treated to Johnny Lever. Who is Johnny Lever? I didn't know either. But apparently, he is India's answer to Jim Carrey. He is a big deal in Bollywood and while he was indeed funny, some stuff didn't work so well. First, comic relief is not what I want in my horror with the exceptions of Shaun of the Dead and An American Werewolf in London. Second, we are introduced to him doing a terrible Michael Jackson impersonation which, given the King of Pop's death, is in very poor taste. Finally, he has a little Eddie Murphy in him because he plays at the most four different characters which just gets confusing because they all look like him, only with different outfits. In one case, he sports a Hitler mustache. Sorry, not joking.

India also likes to incorporate musical numbers. Once again, sorry, I'm not joking. There is also a character in this film named Rhandhir who is commonly referred to as "Boss". His clique consists of people who should honestly be in prison and is himself infactuated with raping Anita. And the writers thought it would be great if rape was funny. Almost every woman who was attacked by someone in this movie either laughs about it later or, in mid-attack, is rescued by comic relief Johnny Lever (still not joking).

However, they did do some things right with this film. They "borrowed" the score from NoES parts 1 & 2, playing it an octave above the original tune, so as not to get in any trouble. Some of the deaths were very cool and the basic formula was there. Anita had a group of friends: Seema (Hinud Tina) and Param (Hindu Rod). They also included some homages to the American films and even had two nods to The Evil Dead. Unfortunately, we were treated to a very small body count and an ending that almost shot for shot came from The Terminator.

All in all, this movie is a conversation piece at best. It would make a dandy drinking game though.