The story is very simple: one afternoon a young woman (who just happens to be beautiful) is alone in her luxurious home. She learns from the TV news that a killer is on the loose and becomes nervous at being alone in the house. A heavy storm begins and a man turns up on her doorstep asking for shelter until the rain stops. Being far wiser than the average Hollywood heroine, she politely refuses to let the stranger in as long as she can. When she does let him in, his odd and threatening behaviour convinces her he is the murderer... until another odd and threatening man also turns up.
In any movie, the film-makers have an unspoken contract with the audience. For example, high-pitched violin music at a moment of tension in the story signifies that moment and reinforces it. Either something happens, or the director subverts expectations when something pointedly does not happen. Another example regarding camera technique is when all shots are from a very low angle looking upwards at characters, as in the Shining where the technique lends the constant apprehension that someone or something is about to strike from behind. Directors can play with such conventions and invent new ones, but the fact remains that there are rules as to their use, and abuse of those rules alienates the audience.
This is the reason I nearly didn't make it past the first half hour of Kaun without walking out. The first 30 minutes consist almost entirely of the young woman looking in closets, flinging open shower curtains and looking under the bed, while the musical score is reminiscent of the moments of greatest tension from movies like Aliens or 2001: A Space Odyssey. In those movies the score rises to a thrilling crescendo as, respectively, Ripley et al escape from the exploding terra-forming site, and Dave encounters the Monolith and it transports him to parallel universes. In those movies, the directors used the score to heighten the images and move the audience in conjunction with the story - they played by the rules.
In Kaun, the young woman has no reason to be scared (yet) and her behaviour is as psychotic as the murderer she fears (notez bien!). To have a blaring soundtrack raise and disappoint expectations so many times in a row outside any real plot context so early in the movie - it was tiring and annoying. In addition, first person shots of the "camera as murderer", racing up the stairs, in this part of the movie also failed to play by the rules when the young woman looks directly into the "eyes" of the camera, then still doesn't see and has to look under the bed. Tiring and annoying.
However, the movie begins to take off when the first stranger arrives. He doesn't look like a murderer, bespectacled and in his business suit. He could be a young Indian dotcom businessman the way he spouts English catch-phrases casually inbetween his Hindi - but then what does a murderer look like? He asks after a name the young woman doesn't know, although the address is correct. The woman tells him there is no-one by that name and he goes away, to come back in a couple of minutes, knocking again. And then again when he says he has locked himself out of his car. And then again for something to eat. And then again to complement the lady on her cheese sandwiches. And then again to watch MTV through the window, passing comments all the while. His behaviour becomes more and more hilarious and disturbing at the same time.
When he tricks his way inside, the audience, like the young woman is kept wavering between the two ideas that he is in fact the murderer, and that he is simply a man who wanted to get out of the rain. Is his increasingly erratic behaviour simply a response to hers, feeding off each other's paranoia? When the young woman is certain he is he murderer and runs from him to flee out the front door - there is another man waiting there. This one is somewhat dishevelled, butwhen she says the other man is a murderer, he reassuringly, and oddly, immediately levels a gun at the other man. This second man claims to be a policeman.
After the humour of the business-man standing outside in the rain asking to come in, then the fright once he was inside, the interaction of the two men, neither of whom can account for themselves convincingly, is once again a source of humour to the audience. Until, after both being held at gunpoint by the woman trying to argue their case, convinced the other is the murderer endangering himself and the woman, a brutal attack takes place, convincing the other one remaining that the attacker is the murderer and leading to a further circle of horror.
Without giving away the story, other facts become apparent, other attacks take place and another person, asking for the same name as the businessman asked after comes and goes. From a poor, overblown and heavyhanded beginning, Kaun (subtitled in Japanese as "Who?") develops into a fine pyscho-thriller which keeps the audience by turns amused, terrified and grasping at straws..
It's fair to compare Kaun to the original Scream in that they both add a new self-reflexive dimension to the horror-genre. However, what Scream accomplishes with improbable plot twists and snappy Friends-like characters and writing, Kaun achieves in a completely credible story with only three unfathomable characters and a single set.
This is a movie well worth watching on a stormy night with the lights out.
In any movie, the film-makers have an unspoken contract with the audience. For example, high-pitched violin music at a moment of tension in the story signifies that moment and reinforces it. Either something happens, or the director subverts expectations when something pointedly does not happen. Another example regarding camera technique is when all shots are from a very low angle looking upwards at characters, as in the Shining where the technique lends the constant apprehension that someone or something is about to strike from behind. Directors can play with such conventions and invent new ones, but the fact remains that there are rules as to their use, and abuse of those rules alienates the audience.
This is the reason I nearly didn't make it past the first half hour of Kaun without walking out. The first 30 minutes consist almost entirely of the young woman looking in closets, flinging open shower curtains and looking under the bed, while the musical score is reminiscent of the moments of greatest tension from movies like Aliens or 2001: A Space Odyssey. In those movies the score rises to a thrilling crescendo as, respectively, Ripley et al escape from the exploding terra-forming site, and Dave encounters the Monolith and it transports him to parallel universes. In those movies, the directors used the score to heighten the images and move the audience in conjunction with the story - they played by the rules.
In Kaun, the young woman has no reason to be scared (yet) and her behaviour is as psychotic as the murderer she fears (notez bien!). To have a blaring soundtrack raise and disappoint expectations so many times in a row outside any real plot context so early in the movie - it was tiring and annoying. In addition, first person shots of the "camera as murderer", racing up the stairs, in this part of the movie also failed to play by the rules when the young woman looks directly into the "eyes" of the camera, then still doesn't see and has to look under the bed. Tiring and annoying.
However, the movie begins to take off when the first stranger arrives. He doesn't look like a murderer, bespectacled and in his business suit. He could be a young Indian dotcom businessman the way he spouts English catch-phrases casually inbetween his Hindi - but then what does a murderer look like? He asks after a name the young woman doesn't know, although the address is correct. The woman tells him there is no-one by that name and he goes away, to come back in a couple of minutes, knocking again. And then again when he says he has locked himself out of his car. And then again for something to eat. And then again to complement the lady on her cheese sandwiches. And then again to watch MTV through the window, passing comments all the while. His behaviour becomes more and more hilarious and disturbing at the same time.
When he tricks his way inside, the audience, like the young woman is kept wavering between the two ideas that he is in fact the murderer, and that he is simply a man who wanted to get out of the rain. Is his increasingly erratic behaviour simply a response to hers, feeding off each other's paranoia? When the young woman is certain he is he murderer and runs from him to flee out the front door - there is another man waiting there. This one is somewhat dishevelled, butwhen she says the other man is a murderer, he reassuringly, and oddly, immediately levels a gun at the other man. This second man claims to be a policeman.
After the humour of the business-man standing outside in the rain asking to come in, then the fright once he was inside, the interaction of the two men, neither of whom can account for themselves convincingly, is once again a source of humour to the audience. Until, after both being held at gunpoint by the woman trying to argue their case, convinced the other is the murderer endangering himself and the woman, a brutal attack takes place, convincing the other one remaining that the attacker is the murderer and leading to a further circle of horror.
Without giving away the story, other facts become apparent, other attacks take place and another person, asking for the same name as the businessman asked after comes and goes. From a poor, overblown and heavyhanded beginning, Kaun (subtitled in Japanese as "Who?") develops into a fine pyscho-thriller which keeps the audience by turns amused, terrified and grasping at straws..
It's fair to compare Kaun to the original Scream in that they both add a new self-reflexive dimension to the horror-genre. However, what Scream accomplishes with improbable plot twists and snappy Friends-like characters and writing, Kaun achieves in a completely credible story with only three unfathomable characters and a single set.
This is a movie well worth watching on a stormy night with the lights out.