by Charles Kirkland, Jr.
A mother is convinced that her abusive ex-boyfriend has come back from the grave to torment her daughter in the Amazon/Blumhouse series movie, Evil Eye.
Pallavi (Sunita Mani) is getting ready for her 30th birthday. Unfortunately, she is single with no man in sight. Her superstitious mother, Usha (Sarita Choudhury) is desperate to find her a mate because it is not good for a woman to be too old to get a man. In an attempt to appease her mother, Pallavi agrees to a blind date. While waiting for the date to arrive, she meets Sandeep (Omar Maskati) and falls in love with him. While everyone believes that Sandeep is perfect, Usha fears something sinister is happening. She believes Sandeep to be the reincarnation of an ex-boyfriend who tried to kill her.
Evil Eye is written by Madhuri Shekar based upon the Audible original she wrote. It stars Mani, Choudhury, and Maskati along with Ramesh Reddy, Lena Clark, Anjali Bhimani, and Bernard White. The movie is directed by the Dassani brothers, Elan and Rajeev. It’s the next film in the “Welcome to the Blumhouse” series collaboration from Amazon and with Jason Blum, the super-producer behind such groundbreaking movies as the Paranormal Activity and The Purge series, Whiplash, Get Out, and Us. Priyanka Chopra Jonas is also the executive producer of the film.
Evil Eye is a horror/thriller movie with a twist because it focuses the horror on an Eastern sense of mysticism that would seem unbelievable to most Western cultures. Reincarnation is a tenet of Eastern religions that has no relevance in the Western culture so from that aspect it makes Evil Eye hard to believe and seem implausible. However, for those who consider themselves “enlightened” the concept and thereby motivations for this film are easy to understand and accept.
Even if it is the case that one believes in reincarnation, Usha is fanatical about her mysticism and goes so deep that even her husband dismisses her rants and supports his daughter in her romantic pursuits. To allay some of her mother’s concerns, Pallavi wears an “evil eye” bracelet which is supposed to protect her from evil people. It is when that bracelet mysteriously falls off that the audience realizes that there may be something to Usha’s claims.
Both Mani (Mr. Robot, GLOW) and Choudhury (Mississippi Masala, A Hologram for the King) are veteran actors who anchor their performances in the frictional relationship between a mother and a daughter who love each other but don’t understand each other.
Their chemistry is genuine and believable at the same time for each one of them even when they are at odds with each other.
In typical Blumhouse fashion, Eye has a twisty ending while this one is a little more telegraphed and predictable, it is a twist nonetheless. However, oddly for this series, this ending comes to a conclusion that is more sensible and understandable if you have bought into the mysticism at the core of the movie.
Evil Eye is not rated by the MPAA but has scenes of violence and gore, profanity, (teen-aged) alcohol, drugs and smoking, and frightening and intense situations. It is another decent effort in a first feature film for Elan Dassani (third for Rajeev) that shows promise for the future.
Grade: C+