Horror films are hot potatoes right now for they are everywhere. But coiled within the format of the horror film, OTT platforms seem intent on delivering certain soluble social messages as well. Because Indian screenwriting isn’t at that mature stage yet, the social sermon has to be encoded into the mesh of either horror-comedy – Stree, Bhoot Police etc – or just horror dramas without so much of the drama. Filmmakers seem convinced that without the thrills or frills of one genre or the other a straightforward punch to the moral gut of this country can simply not be situated. You have to be first entertained, to then subsequently be humbled by the anthem you can spot miles before the credits roll. Like Netflix’s Kaali Khuhi, Amazon Prime Video’s Chhorii, wants to be an eye-opening montage of patriarchal horrors but there is little that is spooky or spunky about this film that meanders, aimlessly for the most part, almost like the field it is set in.
Chhorii stars Nushrratt Bharuccha as Sakshi, a pregnant woman whose husband (Saurabh Goyal as Hemant) is attacked by goons inside their home. Because he can’t pay back the money he owes some ill-mannered people, both husband and wife decide to head to their driver’s village to lie low for a while. Henceforth begins a tale of minor horrors, major genre clichés and a story so unnecessarily twisty it almost muddles its eventual punchline.
Bharuccha is convincing as a to-be-mother but doesn’t know if she should act as the displaced urban woman or a romanticist of India’s hinterlands. This new temporary home, that both Sakshi and Hemant seek refuge in is an ungainly, concrete structure in the middle of a dense field. Crop circles, creepy children and several other horror clichés later we arrive at a message – with a half-decent twist at the end – that you can spot from afar. The film, in fact, gives away its ending right in the middle, and is given to strange, almost enraging screen transitions – blacking out for the sake of retaining obvious reveals for later.
Directed by Vishal Furia, Chhorii obviously originates in the fertile landscape of ‘good intent’ but amounts to nothing more than the dry spell Indian horror seems to be going through. The greasy hand out of darkness, bleating toys, creepy children are all worn, tiresome devices that are best left to the canon of ‘repetition’. Sakshi tries to find her feet in this temporary new home, but is uncertain of the reception it deserves. The mesh of produce around the house, the seemingly no-exit farm is reminiscent of Stephen King’s In the Tall Grass, but is neither as spooky nor exotic. For some reason, the film takes a lifetime to get going, its miniscule horrors are strung so far apart from each other, it almost feels like torture even waiting to be shocked.
Most enraging of the film’s flaws is its inability to anchor any sort of tension for more than a fleeting moment. At 30 minutes too long, the film almost has three endings woven into the piece and yet persists on stretching what is already an un-entertaining ensemble.
Their hosts played by Rajesh Jais and Mita Vashisht, try their best to wring in the local dialect and culture, but beyond such ornamental details, nothing sets this film firmly in a rural context. In one of the early scenes, Sakshi’s reaction to the absence of a cellphone network is a hint at what could have been a compelling arc – the gulf of class on screen, the horrors of no network and western toilets for crying out loud. But Sakshi and Hemant melt into their new, rough surroundings as if it’s a trip to Ranthambore and a campfire has been ordered for with a slide of the best food and wine on the menu.
Bharuccha has already shed significant star-quality in some of her latest work and here as the sole flagbearer of a feminist message, she performs adequately. Unfortunately, the writing lets her down for she is given little armour or ammunition to work with. A nighttime sequence of her frantically mapping the field she is stuck in – with coal on her dupatta btw – seems so vain in terms of narrative relevance it borders on wastefulness.
Chhorri’s story, its convolutions aren’t necessary as bad as the ultimate execution. It’s okay and perhaps wonderful to make cinema around social issues, but to assume that the fuel of moral prescience will alone shoulder a film that needs to accomplish a lot before it actually gets to deliver its message, is naïve. Even if we look past the clichés of horror that even the OTT space can’t seemingly solve for its own sake, there is something to be said about the economy of storytelling, knowing when to cut, when to speak and when to whisper. Chhorrii seems to know none of these, except that its moody and must seem like a redemptive tail, that has arrived on your screen after surviving patently average filmmaking akin to the child-rearing hell it points to.
Rating: 2/5
Chhorrii is streaming on Amazon Prime Video
Manik Sharma writes on art and culture, cinema, books, and everything in between.
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