Written by: Hala Syed
Posted on: June 21, 2018 | 
| 中文
Faizan (Danish Taimoor) and Arzoo (Saeeda Imtiaz)
You can’t always tell the quality of a film through its trailer, but you can usually guess its genre. Wajood, directed by Jawed Sheikh, looked like some kind of action thriller. I wasn’t expecting character development or intellectual stimulation, but I thought it would at least have a fast moving plot. It did not.
The first half is a meandering tedium as high flying pilot Faizan (Danish Taimoor) returns to Pakistan to see his family who are immediately concerned about his marriage. He’s a pilot so we can see beautiful shots of Greece and Turkey and because Danish Taimoor looks good in a uniform, other than that, it’s not really relevant to the plot. His friends take him to a wedding where he meets Q (Ali Saleem) and his sister Arzoo (Saeeda Imitiaz). Q falls for Faizan right away (in a series of unfunny homophobic exploitative scenes) while Arzoo decidedly does not, so of course he has to woo her. By wooing he means he will ruthlessly and relentlessly stalk her, force her friends to ambush her and never take no for an answer.
During this segment of the movie, all the dialogue is exposition and the conversation is unrealistic. The performances are lacklustre and robotic. Poor Nadeem Baig and Frieha Altaf as Arzoo’s parents have nothing to do except occasionally shake their heads and look stern. They’ve promised Arzoo’s hand to someone we never meet, which is fine because he would likely be another pointless cardboard character. Eventually Faizan’s single-minded and single sided pursuit wears down Arzoo and her parents, and they give in.
While I was watching their wedding I thought that it felt like a bad wedding video that family members often subject you to. And lo and behold the next scene was, the whole family gathered at home watching the video of the wedding that just happened!
After an hour of banal mundane moments without purpose, we get our first hint that there might be a twist. There is no slow suspense building here, just an announcement that someone wants to break this marriage up. The sign of a good thriller is that there is a sense of foreboding even when things are going well, where you are kept on the edge of your seat. This is just dull until something stupid happens.
Turns out the stalker has a stalker. Jessica (Aditi Singh) is obsessed with Faizan, and will go to ridiculously far-fetched lengths to get him. The double standard is interesting here, because we are supposed to hate her and think she is crazy, but when Faizan did virtually the same, it was meant to be romantic and endearing. Even their dialogue is eerily similar. There is one main difference.
Spoilers. It’s okay. You were not going to watch this movie. And if you do, you will never get this far into it without walking out.
The difference is that while Faizan was stalking a complete stranger with a self assured sense of entitlement, Jessica is trying to get back the father of her child. He impregnated her, bought her a wedding dress, left her with the excuse that he will convince his parents, disappears, changes his number and gets married! If anyone is the injured party here, it is Jessica. Perhaps her reaction is extreme, but it is at least partially justified.
The last twenty minutes include a murder investigation, complicated relationships, double crossing and alliances. If this was the bulk of the film perhaps it would be halfway watchable. But instead of a carefully crafted suspenseful thriller, we get to watch a man bully a woman into marrying him, and briefly face the consequences of his past actions.
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