Almost every Hindi horror film review of mine in the recent past had a strong reference of this genre having a big fan following in India that is not being fed the right kind of spooky film since last many years. And the craze is evidently still there as I witnessed more tickets being sold for 1920 LONDON this Friday in comparison to TRAFFIC (featuring Manoj Bajpai) and ONE NIGHT STAND (featuring Sunny Leone), that surprisingly was considered a more safe bet in comparison targeting the masses. Moreover watching it in a single screen theatre, the fact got reconfirmed when I even saw couples walking in with their young kids below 15, despite the film having an ADULTS certificate (that ironically might not be anything shocking for many).
So the audience was once again there on the very first day of its release, but the film yet again came up with nothing worth enjoying in the name of horror, with many similar, seen before kind of (supposedly) upsetting sequences supported by loud sound effects forcing you to leave the theater largely dissatisfied, cursing the makers.
As the third installment of the series, 1920 LONDON begins with its terrified leading lady returning from London, since her husband is now possessed by an evil spirit admitted in a hospital there. Narrating the scary incidents to her parents the story moves into flashbacks with court room scenes and introductions of other key characters hindering the pace pretty badly. And then with all monotonous kind of sequences with references of tantriks, daayans, black magic, mystery mirrors and more it fails to deliver anything engrossing, other than the twist revealed just before the intermission bringing in the novelty factor.
However, unable to use the potential twist, the film turns from poor to ridiculous in its second half and fails to enhance the impact made by its opening scenes of the London hospital as required. Further becoming an extremely tough watch, it even dares to end ruining another cult Hindi film track “Gumnaam Hai Koi” in its closing-credits using it as a hook-line.
In the performances, Sharman Joshi just acts professionally without asking any questions leaving his thinking cap home (obediently wearing the odd costumes of a Gadaria-cum-tantrik). Meera Chopra puts in everything she has got in her second Hindi film post GANG OF GHOSTS, but isn’t able to impress the viewers more interested in getting scared. The rest of the cast doesn’t have much to do in the film and both cinematography (including VFX) and background score stick to the fixed format of all Vikram Bhatt movies to give you a fair idea.
However, a surprising novel feature of 1920 LONDON (directed by Tinu Suresh Desai) remains, that here we don’t have any forced erotica as always there in this specific genre conceived in a cheap manner. May be Meera didn’t agree to do it without any purpose or there was some other reason behind ‘the unexpected miss’, but it was really good to see a film associated with Vikram Bhatt not dealing with any sleaze after a long time. In the music department too, we once again have some above average lyrics composed in the typical new-age style (emphasizing on a key Urdu or Punjabi word) that sound similar in tone to every other love song of today’s Hindi film soundtracks.
In short, an appealing twist and no forced sensuality are the only two merits of this repetitive, avoidable venture that can easily be left pending to be later seen on home video along with some multitasking.
Rating : 1.5 / 5
Tags :
1920 London Review by Bobby Sing, 1920 London Movie Review by Bobby Sing, New Bollywood Movies Released, New Hindi Films Reviews, New Hindi Movies Reviews, New Hindi Movies Released, New Bollywood Reviews, Bobby Talks Cinema Review, Reviews By Bobby Sing, New Hindi Films Reviews at bobbytalkscinema.com
