Roohi movie review: A decent horror-comedy

By Murtuza Iqbal

Horror-comedy is surely a tough genre. It's not easy to make the audience laugh as well as scare them at the same time. But, the 2018 release Stree was a perfect horror-comedy. The movie ended with a cliffhanger and we all have been waiting for Stree 2.

But, the makers of the film are making a horror-comedy universe with different characters and after Stree, they have now introduced us to Roohi.

Roohi is based in a small town where it's a very normal practice to kidnap a girl and get her married forcefully to a guy who likes her. Bhawra (Rajkummar Rao) and Katanni (Varun Sharma), who stay there, one day, get a job to kidnap a girl named Roohi (Janhvi Kapoor) and get her married forcefully. But, after the kidnapping is done the marriage gets postponed, so they have to keep Roohi with them for a few days. Soon, they come to know that Roohi gets possessed by a chudail (witch) named Afza whose only wish is to get married. But, if Afza doesn't get married soon, she will kill Roohi. So, will Afza's wish come true or Roohi will die?

Well, the first thing that I would like to say is that don't expect Roohi to be as good as Stree.

The first half of the film is just good in bits and parts. There are only a couple of jump scares and a few funny scenes. In the first half, the writing of Mrighdeep Singh Lamba and Gautam Mehra, and the narration of Hardik Mehta needed to be strong; the film fails to keep us engaged. But, the movie picks up very well in the second half. The drama (not the horror) and the comedy, have been gelled perfectly in the second half, and the climax is damn good. Just like Stree, Roohi also ends with a cliffhanger.

However, the biggest problem in the film is dubbing. There are many dialogues that we can’t hear properly, especially the dialogues mouthed by Janhvi when she gets possessed and becomes Afza. Also, the accent of the actors is not up to the mark, sometimes it feels that the movie is set in Uttar Pradesh, but then the accent of Bhawra sometimes sounds like a Gujarati/Rajasthani accent.

Talking about performances, Varun Sharma steals the show, and he is fantastic in the film. Rajkummar Rao is good, but because of his accent, his performance falters a bit. Janhvi Kapoor doesn’t have much to do in the first half, but she has been given a good scope in the second half, and the actress has performed well. Manav Vij and Sarita Joshi are good in their respective parts.

The music of the film is good; Panghat and Nadiyon Paar are already chartbusters. Janhvi has danced wonderfully in both the songs.

Overall, Roohi is a decent film, but don’t go and watch it with high expectations.

Ratings: 3/5

Watch the trailer here…