Sanam Harjai(1995)

Simran's Hindi debut, which is why I bought it. I have this "thing" about hunting down and watching the first onscreen appearances of my favorite actors. Anyway, I enjoyed the utter badness of this flick. It felt like a 2 1/2 hour paternity test episode of the Maury show, but with songs and


***SPOILERS***

not one, not two, but FOUR murders! Long story, shorter version: Raj(Himanshu), alias Sunny, approaches lawyer KK Verma(Sadashiv Amrapurkar) for advice on how to rape a woman without getting convicted, as all of Verma's clients in rape cases have gotten off scot-free. Raj then uses Verma's tips to impregnate Verma's two daughters, Nillu(Saadhika) and Tina(Simran), as revenge for Verma getting Raj's sister pregnant, then killing both her and his mother when they threatened to expose his dirty deeds. All of this is revealed at a suprise party Raj throws for Verma, who is shocked to discover that the father of Nillu and Tina's respective children is the same guy he was going to represent. Verma attempts to kill Raj but Nillu steps in front of him and takes the bullet instead, staying alive long enough to blame Verma for Raj's misdeeds before firing several rounds into him.

Jump to the present and Raj's adoptive mother(Reema Lagoo) lights into him for ruining the lives of two innocent girls and tells him to man up and take responsibility for the son Tina left on their doorstep a few...weeks? months? earlier. He agrees to this, of course, and accepts both Tina and their son and everyone lives happily ever after.

I think the suprise element would've been greater if Raj's intent hadn't been made evident early in the film. The scene with him asking Verma for pointers on how to get away with raping a girl, as well as the one where Verma successfully defends one of his clients, should've been shown during the flashback episode at the party. And the...two? scenes with Verma receiving a flower bouquet with a "6-6-76" card attached should've been left out, because it was obvious(to me, anyway) that Raj was the one who sent them.

Speaking of Raj, I wish he had been played by someone other than Himanshu. I wasn't feeling him, to put it mildly.

Saadhika was lovely, and at times she sorta resembled Divya Bharati. I think it was the hair and bitchy-but-cute facial expressions.

I had a love-hate relationship with Simran's wig. On one hand, I enjoyed staring at it, but on the other hand, I was like, "Why is she wearing a wig? What was wrong with her natural hair?"

Screencappies:

Saadhika











Simran