In haiku:
"Is my wife a ghost?
"Is my wife a ghost?
Or am I losing my mind?"
Indian Vertigo.
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| Dir. Raj Khosla (1964) |
In the words of Julie Andrews, this movie has been "egregiously overlooked" by Rachel Dwyer in her 100 Bollywood Films. 50 years on, it stands the test of time. I first came to know it through it's timeless and haunting song, "Lag Jaa Gale."
How timeless is it? In Bombay Talkies, the omnibus to celebrate the centennial of Indian cinema, Karan Johar uses the song in his segment as a crucial connection between the two men in the story:
This brings to mind the camp potential of the film. This may explain why I gravitate to its Gothic storytelling - a trait I also share with Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey. It feels like something Charles Ludlam or Charles Busch would repurpose.
(Spoilers ahead.)
I would argue for its inclusion in BAMcinematek's program, "The Vertigo Effect." Woh Kaun Thi explores the same "potent themes":
- Erotic obsession: A haunting in Woh Kaun Thi? is obsession. Dr. Anand could not save the ailing woman / ghost. Those in the business of saving are haunted by those they cannot save. Just ask any doctor, nurse, firefighter, or James Stewart's cop in Vertigo. Dr. Anand also fails to save his girlfriend Seema from a cyanide injection. Those are two worthy damsels to obsess about.
- Identity: It's evident in the title, which translates "Who was she?" There's also the question of sanity that Dr. Anand faces throughout the bulk of the movie.
- Doubles: Sandhya has a twin. One's bad, the other good. Who's who? And then we get to the part of erotic twin fantasy ...
- The link between sex and death: Are Dr. Anand and Sandhya lovers in a past life? Are they doomed to live the same fate? And then we get to the part of necrophilia ...
But the sequence that brings to mind Vertigo is the following scene, reminiscent of Stewart's Scottie dragging Kim Novak's Judy Barton dressed as Madeleine to the bell tower:
My favorite part? It's the most shocking part of the movie: Helen speaks! But of course she is best appreciated in an item number:
