MAHAKAAL (1994) **

Mahakaal is the Bollywood version of A Nightmare on Elm Street.  If you’re reading this review, you’re probably the kind of person who would watch something like this.  It also helps if you have a high tolerance for nonsense, especially if you’re like me and watched a version without subtitles. 

The scenes that are like A Nightmare on Elm Street are easy to follow because they’re rather close copies.  The boiler room sets are adequately reproduced given the budget.  Freddy’s glove also looks like the real McCoy, even if Freddy himself (or whatever they call him in this) just looks like a dude with a messed-up face, mullet, and trench coat.  (Maybe Wes Craven copied this for New Nightmare.)  The music is also fairly close as it just sounds like the original score played in a minor key.  There’s also a fairly spot-on crib of the waterbed death from Part 4.

The plot is essentially the same.  The big difference is that it takes forever for anyone to get killed, and lots of time is spent on inconsequential dance scenes.  (This is a Bollywood movie after all.)  There are also random Kung Fu fights and oddball comedy characters.  One dude is a Peeping Tom hotel clerk with a Charlie Chaplin mustache, but the best character is a Michael Jackson wannabe, who in the film’s funniest scene, struts into the cafeteria dancing to "Thriller"! 

WTF touches like this make it worth watching for Freddy fans and/or aficionados of odd world cinema.  There are even a couple of cool new flourishes, including a scene when Freddy scratches a wall and a bunch of snakes come out, and a strange bit at an aquarium.  However, none of this exactly adds up to a “good” movie.  Nor does it quite live up to its lofty potential.  Like most Bollywood flicks, it’s way too long and has too many dull stretches in between the highlights.  (The long disco number especially bogs things down.)  Still, as A Nightmare on Elm Street remakes go, its miles better than the 2010 version. 

AKA:  The Monster.  AKA:  Time of Death.