From the Ramsay Brothers (the cult horror duo of India, currently undergoing a sort of renaissance thanks to Mondo Macabro’s Bollywood Horror Collection boxset) comes Veerana, a unique possession film that eschews the general Catholic customs of such genre staples to delve into Indian culture, traditions, and religion. The movie follows the tribulations of the Thakur Mahendera Pratap (Kulbhushan Kharbanda) and his family, who incidentally receive the wrath of a local dark priest when his beauty/witch Nakita is killed; she had been preying on the young men in town, and so the Thakur initiated a hit on her to rid the evil in the area. Unfortunately, his daughter Jasmin (Jasmin Dhunna) is the target of the priest’s curse, and Nakita’s spirit inhabits her body to eventually be brought back to life. Years later, Jasmin grows into a beautiful woman, and Nakita begins using her to commit murderous atrocities.
Veerana was more than a minor hit when it released in 1988 despite criticism from the Indian censorship board; it eventually wound up in a cut form to avoid rejection, and went on to garner a mass following as well as skyrocketing star Jasmin Dhunna’s popularity (who later disappeared from acting and public life). One can obviously see why when watching: the movie is a schlocky entertainment vehicle. In a way, it’s something akin to an Indian Evil Dead – excessively melodramatic, overtly cheesy, with just the right amount of (relatively bloodless) violence and nudity-absent sexuality – the film revels in these moments, especially the sex, without ever being able to depict the ultimate climax of those segments, only able to put Jasmin in skimpy outfits or joking about cousin Sahila’s sexy body. This results in many over-the-top moments trying to take advantage without crossing the censorship line.
The movie also has the pleasure of some truly excellent makeup effects for the demonic transformation sequences; again, much like Evil Dead or Demons, these shots ratchet up the campiness while utilizing beautiful colorful lighting techniques that emphasize the ugliness of the witch’s textured face. If there’s one actual complaint about Veerana, it’s that the witch herself (whether in Jasmin form or as Nakita) doesn’t show up enough throughout, instead putting too much emphasis on the male priest who likes to eavesdrop suspiciously in the backgrounds. Still, the Ramsays do put a lot of focus on Jasmin and her transformation, in particular an effective way of changing her looks by giving her some stunning emerald eyes during possession states.
And for those fans of Bollywood cinema, Veerana does not disappoint with a lack of song and dance. Despite the more serious undertones of the horror, the Ramsays sneak in a couple of dance sequences mostly centering around an admittedly inconsequential relationship between Sahila and Hemant (Hemant Birje) with an absolutely sassy musical accompaniment, and even Jasmin gets a siren-esque lure of a tune. While there aren’t any massive choreographic moments, it’s still a pleasing set of interludes to the main storyline.
With that said, Veerana is absolutely too long at 2 hours and 15 minutes. The inclusion of multiple subplots that have little to do with the possession or Jasmin at all mire the pacing; these are presumably meant to add a humorous levity, mostly with slapstick or metatextual references to horror films by way of side character Hitchcock (Satish Shah), but rather than lighten with comedy these scenes just lengthen the film considerably for no reason. The film’s finale also drags things out to almost absurd lengths. There’s easily half an hour of extraneous footage that could have been left on the cutting room floor with no impact to the overall story, and this does tend to make Veerana somewhat exhausting (so much so that the Ramsay Brothers decided to include an intermission break halfway through as well).
But besides the editing choices and the length, Veerana is overall a very enjoyable, refreshing experience thanks to its cultural subversion of generic possession/exorcism films and its often over-the-top theatrics. Fans of Bollywood cinema will certainly find a lot to love here, but horror fans that haven’t experienced the crossover will also enjoy the Ramsay Brothers’ penchant for excessive cheese and scenery-chewing pandemonium.
Blu-ray
Mondo Macabro has released Veerana on Blu-ray with the extended moniker Vengeance of the Vampire; I wasn’t able to find an actual reference to this subtitle, and with Veerana loosely translating to “deserted place” I am not sure where it exactly comes from. The reviewed release is the standalone edition, which was released after the Bollywood Horror Collection boxset with a more limited set of extras. The film has been restored with a 4K transfer from the original negative, and at the start of the movie Mondo Macabro provides a disclaimer that the negative was kept in less than optimal conditions due to the heat and humidity in India as well as less preservative storage techniques. That suboptimal quality is certainly noticeable throughout the picture, as Veerana often suffers from some particularly visible damage and deterioration. It’s clear that the negative contains some heavy color degradation, as whole sequences of the film suffer from color-timing flicker and visible blanching. Occasional softness is present as well, though at other times the transfer does look quite crisp with facial textures and background set designs being of particular note. Film grain tends to be quite heavy, especially prevalent in the film’s relatively few night shots which tend to be obstructed by visual snow. None of these aforementioned issues are all that serious, nor are they the fault of Mondo Macabro’s restoration; it’s simply important to comment that this will not be a pristine-looking film, for this release or any other. In fact, what ends up looking mostly superficial actually makes one appreciate the restoration work that was achieved even more.
The sole audio track offering here is a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono Hindi track with automatically enabled, newly-translated English subtitles. The opening card also references issues with the negative’s audio, but overall the sound quality is pretty good. The film’s soundtrack sounds robust with the dual-speaker mono output, and the dialogue, while at times occasionally muffled or quieted, is still sharp enough even though most audiences will not be interpreting the Hindi language. English subtitles seem correctly translated, including some nuanced cultural references.
This standalone Blu-ray edition features no extras menu, and the solitary supplemental offering is a seven-minute introduction to the movie by critic and Indian film expert Tim Lucas. Though plagued with poster-related mishaps, this introduction is a great source of informational wealth for the uninformed about Indian film, specifically the Ramsay Brothers and their context in Bollywood. It’s a recommended watch prior to the movie. Other than that, the only other offering is a trailer in 480i.
Extra Features
- NEW 4k transfer from film negative, digitally restored
- NEW Introduction to the film by writer Tim Paxton (1080p; 6:24)
- Original trailer (480i; 3:56)
- NEW translated optional subtitles
Verdict
Veerana is worth a watch for those sick of the standard Christianity-tinged exorcism films, and this Blu-ray from Mondo Macabro thankfully brings this Bollywood classic to American audiences with a video transfer that only suffers from the original negative’s decay. If extra features are what you’re looking for, you’ll have to find the full Bollywood Horror Collection boxset, though, because this standalone release is rather barren.
