Bhoot was a box-office hit.[4] Urmila won several accolades and awards for her performance as a possessed wife. Over the years, it has been considered one of the best Bollywood horror films of all time.[5] Verma made a sequel called Bhoot Returns which was released on 12 October 2012.[6]
Plot
The story is about Vishal Bhatia (Ajay Devgn) an investment advisor who is married to Swati Bhatia (Urmila Matondkar). The couple rents a high-rise apartment at a ridiculously low price. The broker of the apartment introduces Vishal to the owner of the apartment, Mr. Thakkar (Amar Talwar) and explains to Vishal that a widow named Manjeet Khosla (Barkha Madan), the previous resident, committed suicide after killing her own son. Vishal hides this fact from Swati, as she will object to renting such a residence. But the owner accidentally slips in the secret.
Swati is extremely annoyed with Vishal for hiding the fact of the previous tenants, although he disbelieves the notions of ghosts and bad luck. Then, Swati starts seeing things and behaving very strangely. Vishal consults Dr. Rajan (Victor Banerjee).
By this time it is understood that Swati is possessed, although Vishal thinks she's sleepwalking. One night Vishal notices that Swati is missing from the apartment. He goes out to search for her only to find her coming out of the elevator. Vishal feels something is wrong and goes to the ground floor, only to see the murdered watchman whose neck had been snapped backwards. This indicates possessed Swati murdered him. Vishal's whole scepticism is trashed. Inspector Liyaqat Qureshi (Nana Patekar), who reaches the apartment to investigate the death, becomes suspicious of the duo and their strange behavior. He follows Vishal and Dr. Rajan.
Vishal's maid witnesses Swati shouting and throwing Vishal away. She helps him tie her and tells him that Swati was shouting just like Manjeet. She also tells him that an exorcist can help her instead of doctors. Finally, Vishal's meets an exorcist named Sarita (Rekha). Sarita sees the ghosts of Manjeet and her son. She advises Vishal to meet Manjeet's mother (Tanuja), since she can placate her daughter's spirit. Vishal complies and meets Manjeet's mother. He learns from Manjeet's mother that Manjeet was not the type of woman who would commit suicide or murder her own son. He explains the situation to her and asks for her help. She comes with him and somehow placates Manjeet's spirit.
They come to know that Mr. Thakkar's son, Sanjay Thakkar (Fardeen Khan) tried to molest Manjeet and when she resisted, she accidentally fell off the balcony and died. Hence, Sarita advises Vishal to call him. Vishal makes an unknown call to Sanjay and tells him that his father is sick. When Sanjay arrives, Vishal cleverly tells Mr. Thakkar and Sanjay to help him take Swati to the hospital.
It is then revealed that many years ago, Sanjay came to visit his father and developed a lust towards Manjeet after he saw her in the apartment. He broke into her house, and attempted to profess his lust, but when she rejected him, he pushed her and she accidentally fell off the balcony and died. Manjeet's young son witnessed the murder, upon which Sanjay hires the watchman to kill him.
Manjeet, who has still possessed Swati's body, sees Sanjay and chases him. Qureshi tries to stop her, having no idea of the real story. Swati tries to kill Sanjay by strangulating him. But, Sarita asks Manjeet to leave him as Swati would be blamed later on.
Sanjay escapes, only to find himself surrounded by Vishal, Sarita, Manjeet and Qureshi who now know the truth. A terrified Sanjay confesses to the crimes, upon which Manjeet's mother urges her to stop. Sanjay is arrested by Inspector Qureshi, and thrown into jail. Manjeet leaves Swati's body, and Vishal and Swati live a good life in the apartment. Meanwhile, in the lockup, Qureshi tells Sanjay that death sentences are light penalties for a criminal like him. He wishes that Sanjay gets a bigger punishment. After Qureshi leaves the darkened cell, Sanjay finds himself face to face with Manjeet. He starts begging for mercy, but his voice soon fades out as Manjeet draws closer; it is implied that she kills Sanjay.
The soundtrack[7] is under the label T-Series. The music of the film was composed by Salim–Sulaiman. It consists of 7 songs, 1 remix and an instrumental. The whole soundtrack is not used in the movie, except the song "Ghor Andhere" for the ending credits. The song "Bhoot Hoon Main" was recreated in film Lupt, which will be showing Nataša Stanković[8][9]
Bhoot is Director Ram Gopal Varma's second horror film after Raat (1992), starring Revathi. He said about the film, "Though technically it is a horror film, we don't see a murder or any overt horror." Further calling it a "hold-on-to-your-seats horror film".[10] He wanted to break the stereotypes of a typical Indian horror of "a woman in a white sari, mists and screeching." He expressed his intentions of bringing horror "to [audiences] homes in the middle of Mumbai." He believed that since horror films were expected to happen mostly in a graveyard or a haunted house on a hill station, their happening in a place where no one really expected a ghost would be scary. Terming the film a remake of Raat in some sense, and citing The Exorcist as a huge influence on Bhoot, Varma also included a message at the beginning of the film where he cautioned pregnant women and people with weak hearts to view it at their own risk.[11] The film creates terror through sound and everyday objects.[12]
"...the film clearly belongs to Urmila Matondkar all the way. To state that she is excellent would be doing gross injustice to her work. Sequences when she is possessed are simply astounding. If this performance doesn't deserve an award, no other performance should. It beats all competition hollow."[13]
Narendra Kusnur of Mid-Day was similarly positive of Matondkar, writing that her "transformation from a simple woman to a possessed spirit is smooth, and she emotes fear very naturally," and concluded:
"Despite many shortcomings, Bhoot scores in terms of its sincere directorial effort, the unusual script (Sameer Sharma and Lalit Marathe), the sharp photography (Vishal Sinha), the absence of unwanted songs and some commendable displays of acting prowess."[14]
Deepa Gumaste of Rediff.com mentioned that Bhoot gave her the same experience of terror as in Cape Fear (1991) and said:
"I wondered if I'd get out of the cinema hall alive. Already, the sleek title sequence, with its astonishing visual effects and stunning background score, had me trembling with trepidation."[15]
Anita Gates of The New York Times noted, "...at some point the overdone scary music becomes part of the fun."[16]
In 2012, producer Jitendra Jain, of Alumbra Entertainment, purchased the rights from Nitin Manmohan and produced Bhoot Returns, which was also directed by Ram Gopal Varma. However, unlike Bhoot, it received mixed-to-negative reviews, and was a box-office disaster.
^"Karan Johar on Bhoot as title for Vicky Kaushal film: RGV gave the name to me in 2 seconds". India Today. 1 February 2020 – via Press Trust of India. Bhoot was the correct title for this film but we didn't have it. I thought at maximum, I'd hear a no from him (Varma) but let me call him. And I was just blown by his generosity. I called him and I spoke to him and he was like, 'Yeah, take it and whatever paperwork you will need, just let me know'. It was like in two seconds that he gave me the title. I've been in this industry for 25 years but I haven't seen this kind of generosity before. ... This is the first of its kind. I am grateful that Vicky headlined the film with us because that gives us a lot of confidence that such films can be made. We want to take this franchise ahead.
