Dybbuk – The Curse is Real “For Viewers”

Amazon prime’s latest release ‘’Dybbuk – The Curse is Real’’ is now streaming on the platform. With Emraan Hashmi returning to the horror genre, Dybbuk is the remake of Malayalam film ‘Ezra’.

Written and directed by the same director Jay K, Dybbuk checks all the points in the template to make a clichéd Bollywood horror movie –

• Lead actors move to some scenic/lonely place – check
• They shift in a lonely spooky old house with a weird house help – check
• One of them gets possessed by a spirit – check
• Spirit has its old revenge story, does some predictable jump scares – check
• And finally a priest does exorcism and gets rid of the spirit – check.

The Plot

Dybbuk starts with Samuel Issac (Emraan Hashmi) moving to Mauritius on a project where his company deals with dumping of the nuclear wastes in Mauritius. He with his wife Mahi (Nikita Dutta) move into an old colonial house.

Sam is always busy with work and wife is trying to cope up with a miscarriage. One day she buys a Jewish box from an antique store which contains an evil spirit. As soon as Mahi opens the box, the spirit gets free and Mahi gets possessed by it.

Over the time Sam also start having some paranormal experiences and finally meets a priest (also his guardian) who tells Sam that the box is Dybbuk as they call in ancient Jewish folklores, which is used for trapping the evil spirits and should not be opened.

Sam then takes help of Benjamin (Jewish Priest) to unravel its mystery and get rid of the evil spirit and save his wife and their unborn child as Mahi is again pregnant. Benjamin warns him that spirit might try to possess his child for revenge and asks his son Marcus (Manav Kaul) to help Sam.

How does Sam get through this, is Marcus able to help him and does Mahi gets free from the clutches of the evil spirit is what the rest of the movie deals with.

Performances –

Emraan Hashmi as Sam has given an average performance and has looked bored for most of the part as he already has done the same roles many times. Nikita Dutta as Mahi is ok and doesn’t get much to do.

Manav Kaul as Marcus deserved much better and he is decent in limited role he has got. Rest of the cast has nothing much to do and have lend the support to the proceedings decently.

What works –

Nothing

What doesn’t work –

Almost everything. From the title which in a way seems intriguing, I doubt could have generated any curiosity with the audience. The plot totally relies on something that has been done to death in Bollywood and is repeated without an iota of novelty.

These horror films rely on the jump scares, background score and unpredictability but everything is missing in Dybbuk. The VFX is sloppy and that in fact diminishes the impact of proceedings to a great extent.

There are no songs in the movie, which though is refreshing change, but songs have been an integral part of Emraan Hashmi’s success even in such horror films, this has hurt the movie as well.

The Verdict –

Dybbuk, has nothing that is unique (barring the title) and that is its biggest flaw. A done to death script, with lead actor clearly looking disinterested, Dybbuk never even tries to hook the audiences. Film tries to touch upon a subplot about nuclear waste disposal in Mauritius but never tries to explore that.

With a very poor script, average performances and not so good VFX and background score Dybbuk is the movie which you would want to give a miss. Strictly avoidable.