Phoonk 2 - Movie Review | Sudeep | Amruta Khanvilkar | Ram Gopal Varma

A phoonk that mere nips at you, gives you goose pimples now and then but never blows you away. In Phoonk 2, Ram Gopal Varma recedes into the shadows and lets writer Milind Gadagkar (who penned Phoonk) step forth and wield the director’s reins. But there’s a great deal of Ramu’s stamp to be seen in the debutant director’s work. It’s as if Ramu turned a ghost director (pun unintended) for this horror film and called the shots from afar.

In a breath, ‘Phoonk 2’ isn’t as scary as one expected. But it does have a few spine chilling moments that can make your ECG go haywire.

Madhu (Ashwini Kaleskar), the black magic woman who cast a spell on Rajeev’s (Sudeep) daughter in Phoonk, returns from the dead to exact revenge from Rajeev’s family that, not learning from the horrors of the past, moves into a new spacious house in a remote location with a deserted beach on one side and a thick jungle on the other. Eerie things keep happening in and around the place. In the woods, Rajeev’s daughter Raksha finds a strange doll that begins to make movements. Unexplained voices fill the house. Shadows flit in and out. Finally, to cast away any doubts, Rajeev’s wife Aarti (Amruta Khanvilkar) is possessed by the spirit of Madhu.

Much blood is spilled and the body count keeps rising as Madhu’s ghost spooks the family; Rajeev, meanwhile, is reduced to a helpless spectator.

Ram Gopal Varma and writer-director Milind Gadagkar know well that you can’t sell the same idea twice to today’s audiences. So the duo does try to add new elements to the story, but by and large, their approach to the genre still remains the same. That building up of the anticipation with background music (loud at times), those heavy silences, the suspense that’s broken with either false alarms or grotesque imagery, or the unconventional camera angles - all the tricks in the repertory have already been tried.

However, a few scenes do send a shiver down your spine. The encounter between the tantric and the evil doll or the sequences in the run-up to the penultimate scene involving Aarti, are scary. Alas, there’s a shade of affectation in performances by almost everyone, though Sudeep, must be admitted, does well in a few scenes. Neeru Singh, the siren from Prince, hots up the proceeding with her skimpy dresses.

But scarce scares and fleeting temptation don’t really make Phoonk 2 a must-watch. A few frightening moments is all you get.

Rating: 2 / 5