Review of ‘Khouf’ series: Smita Singh’s skillful horror project stains the line between real and supernatural

Monica Panwar in ‘Khaf’ as Madhuri. , Photo Credit: Prime Video

After a 2012 new Delhi ganging, one in India, who shaken the country, public buses, late night cinema shows, and metal rods, made a place for themselves in the language of violence against women. So naturally, when you look at NU (Ashema Vardan) in a DTC bus in the capital city, you will be overcome with fear. Anxiety will envelop you because you will see it that she does not make it a way in the middle of an abusive hostel, leads the gaze of creepy men. It appears that the worldly sequence sets tone for Smita Singh’s latest show, Scandal, Where the real supernatural is more rigid; Where the city is both a witness and criminal.

Six months later, Flashforward, the camera now looks at Madhuri (Monica Panwar), who is a graduate from Gwalior, who goes to Delhi to taste freedom in a metropolitan city and survive obstacles on women in Tier 3 cities in India. However, a host of new challenges with familiar misunderstandings welcomes him to the capital city.

In search of affordable housing, Madhuri descends at the hostel gate of ANU and is allotted to the room that was once her. The floor is shared by four other women – Komal (Riya Shukla), Nikki (Rashmi Zuril Mann), a heavy pregnant pregnant Reema (Priyanka Setia), and Svetlana (Chum Darang) – who refuse to set foot outside hostel gates and are openly hostile to their new neighbors. The rumors of whispering about ANU’s death and a supernatural appearance serve as stress for Madhuri’s declining mental state. Insomnia, psychotropic drugs, and masked men’s previous convenor of men, and trauma from a sacred body that disturb Madhuri from time to time. This forces him to bargain with eccentric characters in the city, which kills himself in his life, including a scary looking Hakim (Rajat Kapoor) who takes special interest in his everyday activities.

Whispering and rumors create stress and secret around rooms 333, never bare it for the audience till the very end, which in turn gives us time to sit and question with our prejudices around issues such as rape and revenge. It is easy to use horror themes to narrate Madhuri’s story, as the show does not have to ruin wrestling with the morality of some of its tasks.

Monica Panwar is as fantastic as a do-aid girl to make a place for herself in a sharp city. Since the property is often property by tamasic souls, she opposes her organs and bends her face to provoke her face, attains excellence in using her body like a narrative tool. Pankaj Kumar’s cameras bring the male’s nuances in their anger even after being physically insecure.

Although women in Smita Singh’s world are limited to hostel gates, at their core, they are women who enjoy their agency. Or as March said, “They have brain and they have souls, as well as hearts. And they have got ambition, and they have got talent, as well as just beauty,” some actors know and feel to work consciously.

After the success of films with production studios, the budget for producing women-centric horror films WomanBulbul, And ChoriLeo’s latest creation ensured the grammar of this sub-style, saying that the woman is not for revenge, nor is it cosmetic-we get blood, blood-screaming, and meat. Our last girls are not the most ‘morally honest’; They drink, party, enjoy being scenes, and sketchs shady with men to find their way in their own way.

Fear is currently streaming on prime video