Go Goa Gone
Hindi (A) ¬¬
Director: Raj Nidimoru, Krishna DK
Cast: Kunal Khemu, Vir Das, Anand Tiwari, Puja Gupta, Saif Ali Khan
As zombie films go, Go Goa Gone (G3) one believes, is a decent effort on part of director duo Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK. As one of the first films in the genre to hit the big screens in India, G3 has taken the right path — to blend horror and comic — for straightforward horror has often driven the Indian audiences to fall off their chairs laughing and comedy has missed out, courtesy wrong timing. But Go Goa… (literally and metaphorically) strikes the right balance.
With a simple, virtually non-existent plot of a bunch of friends (Kunal Khemu as Hardik; Vir Das as Luv; Anand Tiwari as Bunny and Puja Gupta as Luna) being chased (in slow motion) by blood-thirsty zombies on a remote island — where Mauritius doubles up as Goa, G3 is a film that sticks to the genre. As horrific creatures who love to gorge on human flesh, zombies have been pet subjects in Hollywood down the decades since the 1930s.
Interestingly enough, this is the first time in Hindi cinema that zombies have come anywhere close to resembling their Western counterparts (in makeup, actions and behaviour) who love to scare. Krishna and Nidimoru have done the smart thing by converting foreign guests at a rave party into zombies overnight — hence maintaining the logical progression in their plot. Indian zombies would not have been half as convincing! In any case, somnambulant beings of the Hollywood type are so much more at ease — since all they have to do is sleepwalk through their role and dialogue is so unnecessary!
While the humour here is largely a result of the camaraderie shared by friends, the horror element is the domain of the zombies.
Saif Ali Khan, initially touted as belonging to Russian mafia, actually is of Delhi origin! It gives him the licence to talk in a silly English accent and Hindi depending on the situation! Not to mention pull out guns at the drop of a hat to shoot zombies in the head — since that is the only way to kill the ‘dead people’.
As a saviour pretending to be a drug lord, Saif somehow fits into the plot which goes from point A to B with little twist and zero turn.
Watch G3, only if you associate gore with funny. Else, am sure, you have better ‘to dos’ lined up for the weekend.
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