Darna Mana Hai

It's like reading a book of short stories from Agatha Christie, Sherlock Holmes, or anyone like them. 6 stories bring to you the unimaginable, the unbelievable, something between fantasy and thriller. We learn about the consequences of bad choices we make in life and they are funny at times, and shocking as well. An earlier comment mentioned that the stories are weird, but that doesn't matter, it makes the movie well worth watching!!! The only minus in it all, is the reason we get for what is happening to our 7 friends who tell us their stories. That is indeed quite weird, but maybe YOU and I didn't even notice.....someone is missing at the end of the movie.......

Now this was a true classic movie from Bollywood standards. I've had mix reactions about Ram Gopal Verma so far. Some of his classics include: Raat, Rangeela, and Road, whereas his major disappointments include Vaastu Shastra and Bhoot (foolish endings). However, "Darna Mana Hai" is a true classic! No songs, no wasting time. This is pure "edge of the seat" psycho thriller. Everyone played a great part from unknown people to Vivek, Nana, Saif and others. Antra mali played a good cameo in the first story that the group shares. Shilpa shetty and sanjay kapoor filled in pretty well as well. The Nana Patekar-Vivek Oberoi encounter was a true classic!!!!!!!!!! I would rate it as undoubtedly the best horror movie from Bollywood. 5/5

Darna Mana Hai turned out to be a movie you can watch once. It is a ghost movie having 6 stories in one story. 7 youngsters are travelling in a car through an empty road late at night. Suddenly the car has a puncture and leads to 6 of them spotting a lantern in the forest and a cozy place where sone one apparently resides( it is a an open courtyard basically). So they light a fire and start saying ghost stories. The first of the 6 stories was pretty horrific featuring Antramali. One by one the youngsters go to the car and are murdered mysteriously. The second and third horror stories were more of comedies and the movie got less horrific after the initial 20 minutes. There are big bollywood stars featuring in the stories like Vivek Oberoi, Nana Patekar, Shipa Shetty, Saif Khan and many others as well. I was startled atleast 4 times in the movie and scared my friend in the process too. It was a movie which was not as good as I had expected it to be. Yet it is interesting and atleast it is innovative which is what I like about movies.

It is a wonderment that a movie of this stature could be made in Bollywood!!! Kudos to Ramgopal Varma and The First Time Director Prawaal Raman. The Movie is totally bizarre and hence very engaging. The Premise of Six friends telling each other stories on a dark, wintry night at lonely spot, the stories that follow, all keep our attention riveted. The stories range from the horrifying to unbelievable. All of the cast have given a wonderful performance. the ones that deserve special mention are Boman Irani, Saif Ali Khan, Nana Patekar, Shilpa Shetty, Raghuvir Yadav and Vivek Oberoi. One remains involved with the happenings mainly due to taut direction, background music and absence of songs(thank the director for that for that). The flow and the pace is fast and smooth. The climax needed more explanation. Thats IT!!! NOW go and watch the movie!!! It is definitely worth your time and money!!

"Darna Mana Hai" comes as a refreshing change in the genre of thrillers. It shows how a horror flick can thrill without being gross. There is little show of blood and gore and thrills the viewer with twists in the tale. Ram Gopal Varma proves himself again as a producer who dares to try something different in each of his movies. This is the second in this series of thrillers following "Bhoot". He has promised to follow this up with a sequel called "Darna Zaroori Hai"!

The film starts with a set of seven friends on their way to Goa when their car breaks down in a desolate part of a jungle. They take refuge in a shelter and to pass the time, start telling each other scary tales. As each one of them gets scared and returns to their car, they get killed. The friends get entangled in a tale of their own. Who the killer is and how the tale of tales ends makes up the rest of the story. The movie is fast paced and leaves the viewers breathless though the ending could have probably been made a bit differently.

Each of the stories stars a plethora of bollywood heroes and heroines. Raghuvir Yadav, Vivek Oberio, Saif Ali Khan, Sohail Khan, Shilpa Shetty, Nana Patekar are just a few of them. Boman Irani and Raghuvir Yadav excel in their roles. Nana Patekar is his usual emotionless self. Vivek Oberios is a star now, what with his apperance on screen setting off hooting and whistles in the theatre.

This novel idea of narration deserves appreciation. I would give it 7/10 for the novel concept and treatment.