Rum movie review: Neither spooky nor a full-fledged entertainer

Director: Hrishikesh, Sanchitha , Vivek, Narain

Cast: Sai Bharath

The trailer of Rum with the tag of ‘heist adventure’ with Anirudh’s music, which delves on special stones, lemons, spirits, murders and retribution, was intriguing. But the final product was neither spooky nor a full-fledged entertainer. Only parts of it seemed to satisfy the premise.

Rum faithfully follows the template of the horror genre – an old haunted bungalow at a remote place, a bunch of actors, few scary moments, blood and gore, a doll that sings weirdly, flashback murders and ghost revenging, high decibel sound, comedy etc. etc. The film begins with two men who are cleaning a haunted bungalow. Suddenly they realize that there are strange things going on in the mansion. A locked room in particular that they happened to open gets them killed.

In the city, we are introduced to a bunch of thieves: Shiva (Hrishikesh), the head of the gang; Riya (Sanchitha), Shiva’s lover; Raj (Vivek), a perpetual alcoholic; and Nepali (Amzath) and Kural (Arjun), a computer wizard. All the five are smooth operators in their con job looting banks and jewelry shops to live a lavish life.

Meanwhile, Thomas (Narain), a wily and greedy police officer comes to know of the gang’s involvement in many heists and starts threatening them with dire consequences if they don’t share the booty with him.

They are entrusted with the job of robbing Rs. 25 crore worth of precious stones and after accomplishing the big heist successfully Shiva decides to dump Thomas. However, Nepali proposes them to spend two days at an isolated bungalow passing it as his own property to keep away from Thomas’ sight. Little did they realize that powerful ghosts are waiting to take revenge there!

Hrishikesh, who was seen in a small role in Dhanush’s VIP has been elevated to a hero here. He has the right looks, but he needs to hone his acting skills. Sanchitha in glam and glitzy outfits provides the necessary oomph. Though Vivek comedy works to some extent, the kind of double entendre dialogues, which he mouths, is difficult to digest.

Neither does it help the film in any way. Narain has hardly has any scope and is just about adequate. Mia George in an insignificant role has been wasted. And the flashback portions are predictable with no solid story. Anirudh’s songs were hummable in audio, but when you watch it along with the visuals they don’t sync. BGM is decent. Director Sai Bharat could have worked more on the screenplay, which lacks the kind of eerie elements that are normally associated with this genre.