In Chhorii, Sakshi (Nushrratt Bharuccha) is taken to a lonely place by her husband when she’s heavily pregnant. She keeps seeing visions of small girls and later learns that her husband has brought her here to sacrifice her child if it turns out to be a female. Guided by ghosts, she somehow makes her escape. Chhorii 2 is set seven years later. Sakshi now has a kid Ishaani (Hardika Sharma), who suffers from a rare skin disorder in the sense that she can’t bear to be out in direct sunlight. Guess what, Ishaani gets abducted and Sakshi and her policeman friend Samar (Gashmeer Mahajani) trace her back to the same village where Sakshi had escaped from earlier. She’s to be made a human sacrifice and its upto Sakshi and Samar to keep it from happening.
While the earlier film was about female infanticide, the sequel also touchesupon that and also throws a gauntlet against child marriage. It also tells you that women are as guilty of spreading patriarchy as men and only when they realise it and become one with the sisterhood that the monster will be killed.
Furia also introduces us to a vampire cult headed by Daasi Ma (Soha Ali Khan). There’s a very Nosferatu-like vampire figure who likes to, well, drink menstrual blood by the looks of it or just the blood or life force – it’s not made clear – probably a mix of all three, of virgins. Of course it’s a stand in for patriarchy, which has been sucking the blood of women everywhere, virgin or otherwise. To make this both blatantly obvious and yet obtuse takes guts and hat’s off to Furia for that.
Soha Ali Khan’s character is shown to possess supernatural powers, as a reward for her blood donation towards the monster. She’s also someone adept at herb lore and converts a seven year old child into a menstruating woman by making her drink some concoction. Of course there’s a redemption arc to her later on, don’t worry.
While camerawork by Anshul Chobey is upto mark, making sure the diverse angles, especially inside the tunnels, keep you interested, the same can’t be said about the screenplay. Having seen Chhorii, we know ghosts are going to come out and help Sakshi here as well so there are no surprises there. The jump scares too are not scary at all. Additionally, when we see the dead women coming together to fight evil, the question that pops up into our minds is why did they bloody well not do so when they were alive? The vampire god looks more like a mummy than a figure who controls a whole village through fear. A good kick in the nuts would have done him in. It’s not clear how he was able to mass hypnotise the entire village population for decades.
The thing about atmospheric horror is that you have to create a claustrophobic space for the viewers. You have to bind them in and fry their senses out. It’s one of the hardest things in the horror genre and while Furia was able to do so in Chhorii, he’s just not as successful here.
Full marks to the protagonist Nushrratt Bharuccha for immersing herself into the role, despite the various absurdities. She’s the very picture of a concerned mother throughout and never once loses her footing. Soha Ali Khan has the more layered role and she too sticks to it, lending an elfin charm to her grey- shaded character. Gashmeer Mahajani does his best to give life to the righteous police inspector he’s been asked to play.
While it’s laudable that Chhorii 2 address such pertinent issues as infanticide and child marriage, it goes about in a very ham-handed way. Watch the film for its sincere performances. The movie is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
See Also: Chhorii 2: First look of Nushrratt Bharuccha and Soha Ali Khan from the horror film revealed