Bhoothnath Returns

After dying, Bhoothnath returns to the world of ghosts and is mocked there too: a ghost who could not even frighten one child. To recover his standing he is sent back to earth. This time what he finds is not someone to scare but something to do. With a boy called Akhrot whom he meets in a slum, he stands in a local election: the candidate is a dead man. The idea grows from that. The dead have no vote, and yet the votes of the dead get cast at elections. Having used this for comedy, the story turns it directly into a campaign and addresses the people who do not go to the polls. The courtroom section argues the same question in legal terms. Nitesh Tiwari directed. Amitabh Bachchan plays Bhoothnath. It follows the 2008 film Bhoothnath but its register is far more political. Bachchan plays the ghost not as a children's-film character but as an irritable, tired man, and that is what works. Who it is for: anyone who likes Indian commercial cinema and satire built on elections. Who it is not for: anyone wanting restraint. The film says its message loudly, runs long, and the shifts between comedy and politics are abrupt.