‘Fear strikes again’
1920 London is a 2016 Indian supernatural horror film directed by Tinu Suresh Desai from a screenplay written by Sukhmani Sadana. The Vikram Bhatt production stars Sharman Joshi, Meera Chopra and Vishal Karwal.
It is the third entry in the 1920 film series, after 1920 and 1920: The Evil Returns.
Plot:
Shivangi, the princess of a royal house in Sikar, Rajasthan, is living in London with her husband Kunwar Veer Singh. They are a happy couple until one day when Veer develops a minor illness that soon flares up into a disease, shrivelling his body and shrinking his head.
Veer is hospitalised and his symptoms worsen – his body begins to contort unnaturally and he begins growling in strange languages. The doctors seem to diagnose it as tetanus, which is incurable. Shivangi is frightened; Veer is just not the same and Shivangi’s handmaiden, Kesar Ma deems it black magic…
Reviews:
“A special mention to the film’s vfx team, art department and the makeup (prosthetics) team for enhancing the look of the film and the characters […] engrossing fare with the right amount of eerie and scary moments. It has its ample share of terrifying moments that one expects from a film about supernatural forces.” Bollywood Hungama
“The storyline and plot for 1920 London are very good. Equipped with beautiful musical scores throughout, and ambient, erotic, and romantic undertones., that sends you into a dreamscape The film can be very personal at times.” Stacy Cox, Decay Mag
“Corny dialogues such as “we will live together and die together” and sappy songs with lovers dancing around in picturesque locations will make you nauseous. While the first few scenes in which evil spirit unleashes her fury are startling, it gets tiring.” Manjusha, Gulf News
“It is a mixture of horror, unrequited love story and whole lot of drama. The clichéd dialogues and the primitive-story line of 1920 London will torture you to the core. Further to it, the silly songs that have been forcefully added will kill the residual curiosity in the film.” Akshata Shetty, India.com
“Certainly, 1920 London adopts the possession theme in ways that are distinctive to Bollywood – the exorcism ceremony notedly makes use of water from the Ganges as opposed to holy water. Yet for all that, the film still draws from the kit and caboodle of cliches created by The Exorcist (1973)…” Richard Scheib, Moria
“There are corny dialogues that provide some comic relief. And the visual of a flying Sharman ala Shaktiman, will have you in splits. Clearly, the actor sleepwalks through his role and a good pay cheque seemed like his only impetus to see this through the end. Meera is abysmal and the rest of the actors with their grim voices are not worth mentioning.” Mohar Basu, Times of India
Cast and characters:
- Sharman Joshi … Jai Singh Gujar
- Meera Chopra … Shivangi
- Vishal Karwal … Veer Singh
- Meenal Kapoor … Witch
- Gajendra Chauhan … Tantrik
- Sushmita Mukherjee … Kesar Maa
- Surendra Pal … (Raja) Shivangi’s father
Release:
At the time of writing, 1920 London is available on Netflix in the UK and USA.
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