Bacho. Bachao. Shaitan on the prowl.

Kalki, aka Amy aka Saira aka Shaitan was not actually the shaitan in the film, as has been popularly proclaimed by a lot of people who have watched the film. I dont think Shaitan, the film, is about one particular evil mind but about the devil that resides in each one of us.

It didn't really need a film to remind us that there is an off-beat side to all of us, which when given slight vent, can flare up into a bigger monster. To me, more than the film, it is the background score that reminds me of the wild side that exists in me. For sure. Each time I listen to the music from Shaitan, there is something in me that stirs. For some reason, the small rebel streak in me awakens each time I listen to The Sound of Shaitan. When I listen to Josh, I know I imagine myself in that (damn) Hummer, feeling powerful at the steering wheel (even though I do not know how to drive, leave alone drive a Hummer). When I listen to Hawa Hawai, I can just about imagine myself after smoking a joint, rolling in clouds, flying like a fairy through rainbows, beaming like sunlight on the surface of clear water, being the dew on a fresh morning leaf. Its almost a pretty picture but what makes it "Shaitan-ic" is its out-of-ordinary imagery from my actual real life.

When I listen to Pintya (the somewhat festive song), I imagine myself at a rave, jumping all night to the intensity of each note. When I listen to Khoya Khoya Chand, I reminisce the sense of romanticism I used to feel during each time I struggled with small things. I remember having felt like a character straight out of a movie when once upon a time, my local train had stalled away from Dadar station, and it was raining and my phone was out of battery. For some strange, in-explicable reason, there was some random sense of heroism I had felt, that suddenly, I was away from the familiar territory, I didn't know anyone around me, no one knew where I was and I was out of reach. All I could do was trudge along with the huge mass of other people and slowly find my way back into the city. For some reason, it was a thrilling experience.

You see, none of the above is evil but its an obtuse part of our personality that exists, whether we agree or not, whether we can see it or not. And we don't need to be coke-heads, rich kids with no aim or any such sort to know intrinsically that there is a Shaitan in us, in each one of us.

I feel good knowing I have a Shaitan. I am also scared sometimes knowing there is a Shaitan. Its after all, only a thin line separating us from that Shaitan. Who is to say that if we were not pushed a little, if circumstances did not present them in a different manner, if life did not have other plans, our Shaitan would not come out in exactly the same way that it did for the 5 friends in the film.

To be honest, one of my favorite scenes from the film were when one of the 5 guys takes off his belt to hit himself and in fact out-does the religious man, right in the beginning of the film. The other fascinating bit in the film was the Khoya Khoya Chand sequence. BEAUTIFUL. INCREDIBLE. SORDID and SADISTIC. In a very Tarentino way, the gory scene was juxtaposed with a romantic song and shot in such a soulful manner that it almost romanticized the fight, the blood, the dying and the gore. The way the dead girl is shot at again and again has to be a reflection of a sick mind but appreciating that has to be a sicker mind. The only reason I think one can appreciate that sensibility of the movie is because it related to the internal Shaitan in me and possibly a lot of other people too. What other explanation could there be for that?