‘When desires turn evil…’
Raaz 3D (translation: “Secret 3D”) – aka Raaz 3 and Raaz 3: The Third Dimension – is a 2012 Indian Bollywood horror film directed by Vikram Bhatt (Raaz Reboot; Creature; 1920) from a screenplay by Shagufta Rafique (Alone; Raaz: The Mystery Continues). It stars Bipasha Basu, Emraan Hashmi and Esha Gupta and is the third entry in the Raaz franchise.
The film was released to mixed critical reception. However, it emerged as a major commercial success in India and is the highest-grossing film in the Raaz trilogy as well as the highest grossing Hindi horror film ever.
Opening plot:
Shanaya (Bipasha Basu) is an actress at the height of her success. She gets offered the best roles and wins all the awards she is nominated for. In addition, she also has a passionate affair with a handsome director named Aditya (Emraan Hashmi).
This all ends when a younger actress, Sanjana (Esha Gupta) makes her film debut. In place of Shanaya, Sanjana comes into spotlight and begins to snatch away her awards. Suddenly, Shanaya seems forgotten and everybody only wants to work with Sanjana.
Soon enough, Shanaya sees her career fading away and her envy slowly becomes craziness. She begins to turn to black magic and makes it her goal in life to destroy Sanjana’s career and make her the pain of loss…
Reviews:
“Director Vikram Bhatt doesn’t miss an opportunity for a callback (you didn’t think you’d seen the last of that creepy clown in the photo with Sanjana, did you?). There are some cool sets as well, from Shanaya’s glamorous apartment to the eerie pond in the slum where she bargains with the evil spirit.” Kathy Gibson, Access Bollywood
“Within this genre, Raaz 3 has an interesting set up, but like most Hindi films it takes too long to tell it and relies on too many clichés, eg invoking the spirits in a graveyard; the evil woman wearing black, the victim wearing white; scary clowns etc. The dialogue is often so ridiculous that proceedings become involuntarily funny…” Udita Jhunjhunwala, Business of Cinema
“The much-touted flying cockroaches, I am sorry to report, are not scary at all – not even in 3-D. The rest of the time the film meanders its way through expeditions to the kingdom of spirits – long-drawn dream sequences in which our protagonists have a chance to physically battle embodied versions (heavy chains, pools of water, axes) of their disembodied fears – via the usual collection of psychiatrists, doctors and tantriks in graveyards.” Trisha Gupta, First Post
“Bhatt has made a number of scary movies, but here he doesn’t offer much that’s new or original, relying instead on a blaring soundtrack and standard-issue fright elements such as a crazed clown, buckets of blood and a maggoty corpse on the loose.” Lisa Tsering, The Hollywood Reporter
Cast and characters:
- Bipasha Basu as Shanaya Shekhar
- Emraan Hashmi as Aditya Arora
- Esha Gupta as Sanjana Krishna
- Manish Chowdhary as Tara Dutt (Ghost)
- Sunil Dhariwal as Sonu
- Mohan Kapoor as Doctor
- Jagat Rawat as Tantrik
