Shakti

Shakti: The Power is quite intense. If this had been one of the first Indian films I’d watched, I would be traumatized to this day. But unfortunately, I've seen crazy things like Fair, so I suspect it could be worse. Or rather... Karisma Kapoor plays a young wife and mother who lives in Canada with her husband, who she thinks no longer has a family. So far, so good. There’s nothing crazy about that. But then it turns out that the husband isn't an orphan after all, so his whole family is coming for a visit. So far still good. There are some cultural differences, a few shocks, and some confusion as to what is actually happening and why everyone is doing what they are doing. But then I stopped understanding it altogether. Karisma is caught up in the maelstrom of a kind of war, living on a pile amongst the dung and homemade grenades. Her father-in-law is a local mob boss and, besides being crazy, runs a gang spread over 40 villages. But he has a rival who killed his son. So he needs a successor, and that's meant to be Karisma's husband. But he soon dies and his duties are transferred to his young son... It may not sound that scary, but you have to see it to understand. Karisma is still squinting those huge eyes of hers, and it all breaks down into a disgusting action skirmish. Karisma tries to escape several times, hysteria alternates with violence, incomprehension alternates with an attempt at spontaneous combustion, the father-in-law tries to beat Karisma to death... and then we get a comedy (!) interlude with Shah Rukh Khan. And instead of me being happy that he's dreaming about Aishwarya Rai (who plays herself), I just can't stop counting every single WTF moment, one after another. Sure, Shah Rukh Khan runs around with a bullet in his back for half a day... but then there’s the ending (!!!). You have to see it for yourself. The Festival of the Hardened Spectator awaits. (20/01/2012)