Rum - An empty bottle for the most part

Bharath Vijayakumar

The first few minutes of Rum gives you a scare. It is not the horror kind of scare but a certain amateurishness in the presentation and acting that scares you about the remaining two hours.We are shown a paranormal research centre with an expert talking about spirits. But the entire scene looks so artificially staged with actors speaking dialogues as though they are reciting rhymes from their memory that the film develops an immediate disconnect with us.But things do get progressively better.

Plot:

The perpetrators of a heist get strangled in a haunted house.

Cast:

If not for Vivekh, Rum could have hardly been tolerable. Not all the jokes work but the actor looks relaxed and he lights up quite a few scenes.The rest of the cast hardly make an impression. There is a scene where Vivekh trolls Hrishikesh (who supposedly plays the leading man) for his inexpressive face.You have a hearty laugh. But this cannot be an excuse for the almost non-acting by Hrishikesh through the entire film.

Direction:

Sai Bharath has tried to package Rum differently but there seems to be no method to the narration. The film keeps showing separate tracks and moves back and forth. You pretty much know where it is heading to but you still have a lengthy flashback that reeks of boredom.The songs are woefully placed and pop up at their own will. Anirudh's background score in the first half tries to infuse some artificial excitement when there is hardly anything interesting happening on screen.

The CG work is poorly done and any genuine scare that the lead up scene builds up is lost once the ghosts appear on screen.

Bottomline:

A few laughs, very few scares and the rest is boredom.

Rating: 2.25/5