Vishal Furia, arguably one of the most dedicated and efficient horror film practitioners around, has set his latest spine-chiller in a children’s hospital. The Marathi-language Bali, which is out on Amazon Prime Video, takes places in a colonial-era structure that has one wing walled off.
Here, seven-year-old Mandar starts having visions. Admitted for a check-up after a health scare, Mandar (Samarth Jadhav) befriends a boy his age. Bhaskar, who has cancer, says his mother’s name is Elizabeth, she lives in the walled-off portion, and she will set everything right.
Mandar’s father Shrikant (Swwapnil Joshi) is sceptical, especially after Mandar’s doctor Radhika (Pooja Sawant) educates him about shared psychosis – the phenomenon of a group of people being infected by the same delusion, as in an epidemic.
It’s not hard to see where the 103-minute movie is going. The revelation is too pat and a disappointment after a series of effective jump scares and scary moments involving children. But Furia’s hold over pacing and atmospherics, evident from Lapachhapi (2017) and its Hindi remake Chhorii, ensures that the tour of the hospital’s grisly secrets is frightening enough.
Efficiently performed by Swwapnil Joshi, Samarth Jadhav and Pooja Sawant, Bali offers itself up for a Hindi remake – a prospect as predictable as the climax.
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