Killer B's on DVD: The Bollywood Horror Collection, Part 1

Mondo Macabro promotes itself as presenting "The Wildside of World Cinema," and with previous releases like Satan's Blood, Girl Slaves of Morgana Le Fay and Lifespan, these guys have managed to unearth some magnificently obscure exploitation gems from all corners of the globe. As the title of this Mondo Macabro release implies, The Bollywood Horror Collection contains a pair of horror flicks from India directed by Tulsi and Shyam Ramsay, whose films ushered in a trend in Bollywood horror. Incidentally, Wikipedia defines Bollywood as "the informal name given to the popular Mumbai-based Hindi language film industry in India. The term is sometimes used incorrectly to refer to the whole of Indian cinema."

The first film is 1990's Bandh Darwaza (we'll save the second film Purana Mandir for the next installment of Killer B's on DVD). The IMDB lists The Closed Door as an alternate title, but I'm not sure if this is a literal translation. The story owes a great deal to Bram Stoker's Dracula, though the final product has a flavor all its own. Laju and her husband Pratap have been trying unsuccessfully to have a child for several years. When Laju overhears Pratap's aunt advising her son to find a new wife with whom he can conceive an heir, the young bride feels forced to take desperate measures. At the advice of a servant named Mahu, Laju seeks help at Black Mountain, which the film's narrator describes as "a lonely and evil place where a hideous monster lurks in human form." Laju takes part in a ceremony at Black Mountain, which culminates with her unholy union with the aforementioned monster, a vampire-like creature (though the V word is never used) sporting a halloween store Dracula cape and red contacts that must hurt like a bastard. The creature promises Laju a child. If it is a boy, then Laju and Pratap may keep it, but if Laju gives birth to a girl then she belongs to The Black Mountain and must be turned over to the creature and his followers. The child, of course, is a girl and is given the name Kaamya. When Laju refuses to turn the child over, she is killed and the child is kidnapped. Pratap rescues the baby from Black Mountain and kills the fanged creature in the process.

Amazingly, this all happens before the 17-minute mark. After some very confusingly placed credits, the story then jumps ahead 18 years, and deals mostly with Kaamya's unrequited love for a young man named Kumar, who is betrothed to a woman named Sapna, who witnesses a human sacrifice at Black Mountain. Things get pretty confusing from here on in. The story doesn't flow organically, rather it bounces around like a pinball, cutting randomly between this love triangle, and the goings on at Black Mountain, which include the reanimation of the guy with the cape and fangs (he's never given a proper name). As the film winds down and more of the cast are getting fanged, the resemblance to Dracula becomes more obvious.

This was my first exposure to Bollywood cinema, though I had heard of the penchant for song and dance numbers, but that certainly couldn't apply to horror films, could it? It can, it does, and you simply have to see this. On four occasions throughout the movie, this otherwise straight horror film suddenly morphs into a musical, and characters inexplicably break into song. While I'm sure this is business as usual in India, it was utterly hilarious to me, at least for the first few numbers. Beyond that I found myself muttering "Oh God, he's going to sing again" when the music began to swell on the soundtrack. Speaking of music, the score is quite effective, with much of the music swiped from films like King Kong, and Friday the 13th, the latter of which even includes that creepy vocalization that usually means Jason is lurking around somewhere.

On one hand this film is fascinating, showing an approach to horror cinema I had never seen; on the other hand, it's painfully long. With a running time of nearly two-and-a-half hours, Bandh Darwaza could easily have been trimmed by an hour. If you're looking for something weird and different, I say check it out, even if you have to watch the film over two or three sittings.