Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!
Plot Summary: Nonsense. Sheer nonsense.
Review: Apparently India made, not one, not two, but, THREE remakes of "Shutter!" The other two are "Sivi" and "Photo," but all three were failures. I will note that I'm not going to review the other two movies since I couldn't find subtitled versions. Now, you may be wondering, why they would even bother with this three separate times? Well, the Indian film industry is complicated with huge, competing regions, of which, each remake was made independent of the others. Most foreigners only know about Bollywood productions, which is what this movie is, but there are many other internal industries besides Bollywood. At the same time, Indian movies do not--how shall I say--follow a narrative structure most people would consider the standard for film. Essentially, you have a lot of singing and dancing interspersed between scenes which completely ruins any atmosphere or pacing. Due to the nature of the industry, and how their films are marketed, it can be polarizing to foreigners experiencing it for the first time. For me, this is why I don't tap into that region's horror films since they are not my cup of tea to say the least. To each their own though.
So...if you ignore all the wannabe music videos strewn about, could this still be interpreted as a worthy remake? NO. This movie is absolutely HORRENDOUS! The film quality keeps dropping and rising--at one point it looked like a movie from the '70s. The special effects are weak and the cinematography reminds me of a terrible soap opera; the moronic camera angles and amateur lighting are painful to behold. I've never seen a movie honestly try to turn a little fishy swimming in its tank into a jump scare. That's a good one. Even a guy tapping on a window is meant to be, what, scary?! Little kids--suspiciously hanging out at a gas station in the middle of the night--making camera hand gestures are further demonstrations of the scares apparently. And here I was thinking the American remake was bad. That movie was just a terrible attempt to capitalize on "Shutter," but this remake couldn't even respect the source material. The American remake used minimal makeup effects for Megumi, but Ms. Okina took the role seriously. This Natre equivalent, Aarti, does have makeup on, but she looks heroin-chic with laughable black circles around her eyes. Aarti, as a character, is nothing like Natre in that social outcast way; she's mostly a regular girl who inexplicably goes crazy when the Tun equivalent, Avi, breaks up with her. Also, the stupid singing makes Avi seem like he really loved Aarti when Tun never really loved Natre. I can't imagine a more insulting tribute to Natre than this.
The Jane equivalent, Sonia, is really hot though. In fact, she looks a little too high maintenance for our dear Avi to manage and way out of his league. I mean, Avi is running around with a sweaty mullet that looks like a wig I want to rip off! The actors do not understand their roles for shit, but I doubt anyone on set understood what made "Shutter" work so remarkably well. This movie is too lighthearted and they painfully change it to make Avi more sympathetic. Imagine this is how things played out in "Shutter:" Tun doesn't take the photos of Natre when being raped, he tries to go to the police, and Jane ends up still loving him after she discovers the truth. Sounds stupid, huh? This movie didn't seem to think so. While they do try to recreate the scares, in the most pitiful of ways, they alter the story too much. I have no clue what they were thinking, but this is like the made for TV version of "Shutter" if we were in 1990.
The movie clocks in at over two hours--if you want to torture yourself for that long, be me guest. I needed many, many breaks to ease me through the ordeal. I was laughing though--quite a bit actually--but I get the idea that was not their intention. There is one scene in particular that had me tearing up with laughter due to the overwhelming levels of stupidity. Good lord. Needless to say, this movie is terrible from start to finish. All the remakes in the world aren't going to come close to touching the greatness that is the original "Shutter." If you want a proper experience, free of idiocy, stick to the Thai film and pretend the rest of the shit doesn't exist.
Notable Moment: When Avi and Sonia meet the ghost-photos guy. This scene is so ridiculously bad it could easily be misconstrued as parody. Must be seen to fully appreciate.
Final Rating: 2.5/10
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