NathanielLee is a writer for The Hollywood Insider who focuses on writing feature and review articles. He is an aspiring filmmaker who specializes in the horror and surrealist genres as well as indie filmmaking. Nathaniel believes that film is a powerful tool that can be used to stir up and bring valuable change to the world through messages and internal meanings. He also believes in the mantra of the smaller the better and sincerely believes that entertainment with meager budgets has the power to alter society altogether. As a result, his views align with The Hollywood Insider’s mission statements concerning anti-gossip and positive journalism with a focus on improving the world through uplifting others instead of tearing them down. Nathaniel is currently applying to universities where he looks to study film.
Sep 21, 2022
Table of Contents
Photo: ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’
‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ is a 2022 comedy horror film written by Aakash Kaushik and Farhad Samji and directed by Anees Bazmee. Although it should be noted, and I will go into more detail on this later, that the genre of ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ is kind of a toss-up between a bunch of different genres. There are musical elements, horror elements, comedy elements, action elements, and even drama elements. There is no doubt that ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ has something for everyone but is that necessarily a good thing? Like I said, I will expand on this question later. As for the story of ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2,’ well it is kind of a doozy as well.
The film follows a man named Ruhaan played by Kartik Aaryan and a woman named Reet played by Kiara Advani. After the two meet, Ruhaan manages to convince Reet to stay with him for a while and miss her ride back to her family. Incidentally, that ride goes horribly wrong and many die in an accident. Reet then, who is being forced to marry a man who she does not love, uses that opportunity to fake her own death and miss her wedding so that her sister who really loves Reet’s would-be husband can marry him instead. The pair of Ruhaan and Reet then travel to Reet’s hometown to hide out from Reet’s family and Ruhaan slowly starts to develop ties with the family as he begins to convince them that he can talk to spirits. This is where I will stop explaining the plot for fear of spoilers. As you can see, the plot of ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ is a little ridiculous and unreasonable. But that is not where the negative aspects of this film stop. I will dive more into those later, however.
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The things I liked about ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’
Contrary to what you may believe, there were some aspects of ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ that I actually did enjoy. First off, there are some fairly funny and humorous parts of the film which made me start to laugh multiple times throughout the film’s bloated runtime. While certainly not all of the jokes land, the ones that do land certainly land well and are quite funny. Ruhaan, while being a tad insufferable at times, is also funny at other times and the man who played him, Kartik Aaryan, did a great job at controlling his body language in order to make some lines funnier than they already were.
Another aspect of this film that I enjoyed was the vast variety of characters that are in the story. There are a plethora of characters in ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ and they are all unique and special in their own ways. This really adds to the family dynamic of Reet’s family in ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ and does a great job at making many scenes very interesting and funny as well. It seems that each character has their own goals and ambitions in the story, which is something that is not found in a lot of films today. For that, I applaud the filmmakers behind ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2.’
One of my main gripes with ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ is that the film never really feels like it makes a home with any particular genre. What I am saying with that is that the film bounces around into different genres so often that it ends making the film feel disjointed and without a solid center to keep the film afloat. As I mentioned previously, this film has musical sequences, horror sequences, action sequences, and more. All of these contribute to the film feeling tonally lost. It also leaves the audience wondering exactly what the filmmakers were going for with this because, as I said earlier, while there is something for everyone, there is certainly not enough for anyone.
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Another issue that I had with ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ was the story as a whole. The whole thing is a ridiculous mess. While this may at times work in the film’s favor, sort of in a so-bad-it-is-good type of way, most of the time it leads to the film feeling completely lost thematically and storywise. Everything with Ruhaan keeping up the ruse that he can speak to spirits to Reet managing to fake her own death is simply grossly unrealistic and confusing. Now I understand that this is a movie and that unrealistic things happen all the time in great movies, but when you completely throw realism out of the window in a film that, for at least part of it, is supposed to be grounded in realism, it creates a huge mess that the audience has to somehow manage to put back together.
With all that being said, I will have to say that I would not recommend ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ to anyone who was not a fan of the first film. The only pull that I can with wanting to watch this film is that it is a sequel to a film that has a devoted fanbase. But other than that I would recommend that you go out and spend your money to see this film. While the characters and some of the humor may be excellent, the story is simply not there. The plot is the most important thing in a movie and ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ simply fails completely at establishing a coherent storyline for the audience to follow. The film also tonally is a complete disaster, with many parts of the film feeling like vignettes as they are so tonally different from one another.
All in all, I would say that ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2’ is a film for fans of the original ‘Bhool Bhulaiyaa’ film and for no one else as a result of the disjointed story and tone.
Make sure to check out ‘Brahmāstra: Part One – Shiva,’ another popular Hindi film which is out in theaters right now.
Director: Anees Bazmee
Writers: Aakash Kaushik and Farhad Samji
Producers: Anees Bazmee, Bhushan Kumar, Murad Khetani, and Krishan Kumar
Cast: Kartik Aaryan, Kiara Advani, and Tabu
By Nathaniel Lee
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NathanielLee is a writer for The Hollywood Insider who focuses on writing feature and review articles. He is an aspiring filmmaker who specializes in the horror and surrealist genres as well as indie filmmaking. Nathaniel believes that film is a powerful tool that can be used to stir up and bring valuable change to the world through messages and internal meanings. He also believes in the mantra of the smaller the better and sincerely believes that entertainment with meager budgets has the power to alter society altogether. As a result, his views align with The Hollywood Insider’s mission statements concerning anti-gossip and positive journalism with a focus on improving the world through uplifting others instead of tearing them down. Nathaniel is currently applying to universities where he looks to study film.
NathanielLee is a writer for The Hollywood Insider who focuses on writing feature and review articles. He is an aspiring filmmaker who specializes in the horror and surrealist genres as well as indie filmmaking. Nathaniel believes that film is a powerful tool that can be used to stir up and bring valuable change to the world through messages and internal meanings. He also believes in the mantra of the smaller the better and sincerely believes that entertainment with meager budgets has the power to alter society altogether. As a result, his views align with The Hollywood Insider’s mission statements concerning anti-gossip and positive journalism with a focus on improving the world through uplifting others instead of tearing them down. Nathaniel is currently applying to universities where he looks to study film.
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