Cast: Bipasha Basu,Nawazuddin Siddiqui,Doyel Dhawan,Shernaz Patel Director: Suparn Varma IE Rating: ** In the initial bits,Aatma pitchforks us into a nice case of thrills and chills. The mother of a little girl is troubled. Her daughter talks to someone no one can see,giggling conspiratorially. Sinister things start happening around this tiny unit,readying us for a solid spooky session. But Aatma soon begins to unravel in ways that lessen that fear,and leaves us with a film that could-have-been. No time is wasted in setting up Maya (Bipasha Basu) as a young,beautiful mom conflicted about how to tell little Nia ( Doyel Dhawan) about her beloved fathers (Nawazuddin) fatal accident. We are led up smoothly,after the fact,to a man who was abusive and violent to his wife and extra-loving to his daughter. A pesky classmate who bothers Nia is the first to go; a strict teacher is the next: till then the film handles itself well. Some well-executed sequences make you jump. And then the aatma reveals itself,and from there its all downhill. An old hag hobbles up with a prophecy, a pundit starts conducting a havan,and other predictbles pop up. The space for little girls with curly locks who cause strange things to happen is a crowded one in movies around the globe. Dhawan is well-used and mostly effective,and is the high point o>f Aatma. Nawaz breaks through in some strongly-performed scenes but doesnt fit well with Basu,who is her usual svelte self,but not really up to the task of yielding to terror. And that,apart from the slack writing,is the films problem. With its somber palette and plot-with-potential,Aatma could have been a true scare-fest. But it winds down to being well begun,half done. shubhra.gupta@expressindia.com
