Lady Boss (1988)
Cast: Shahid, Naghma, Mussarat Shaheen, Badar Munir, Shehla Gill
Director: Baqar Rizvi
Synopsis: Fantastically absurd hidden cult masterpiece is genuinely a giggle a minute stuff!
Reviewed by: Omar Khan

A pert young journalist, Dolly warns her beau that his partner, Badar Munir, has been framed by the notorious crime Don, Lady Boss and is awaiting the gallows. The sidekick friend, a master of disguise, decides to spring his buddy out of jail. Once that is achieved, they vow to destroy the evil Lady Boss once and for all.

They begin their quest by disguising themselves as hippies and frequenting the local nightclubs, where they encounter the alluring curves of Mussy Shaheen and her friends. They also discover the secret hideout of the crime kingpin, Black Cat.

The two brave young undercover cops plant bugging devices in strategic places in Black Cat’s underground lair, and steal a critical map detailing the criminal’s underground network and current schemes for world domination.

While Badar collects the unknown stash, one of Black Cat’s futuristic monitoring devices alerts the militia. Fortunately, the two heroes make good their escape, owing to some hair-raising stunts. After an exhilarating car chase, Badar and his friend manage to get away as the timely intervention of a railway train delays Black Cat’s henchmen.

Meanwhile, the focus returns to the pretty and fiercely devoted young lady journalist and her boyfriend (Badar’s partner), who proceed to set the screen alight with a gloriously synchronised dance in the local gardens with several tantalizing costume changes along the way.

Then the action switches to Black Cat’s secret dungeons, where Agent 339 (Naghma), a top agent in the Black Cat crime syndicate, ruthlessly shoots dead the accomplice who failed to apprehend Badar. She shoots them in cold blood and throws their bodies into the nearby gutter. Moments later, Agent 339, also known as Lady Boss, also known as The Sparking Lady, is summoned by a flashing red bulb and an irritating buzzer, indicating that the Supreme Leader Black Cat is about to issue a command to his loyal subjects. “007-129 Sparking Lady 339, come on the Line” booms through the speaker systems as The Black Cat summons his chief disciple, Lady Boss Naghma, to reprimand her for the failure of the henchmen.

Wearing his trademark black cat-suit, the Black Cat is seriously pissed off that Badar and his friend were allowed to get away with the secret map. He is slightly amused when he hears of the thousands of deaths caused by the company’s latest lethal biological gas. Black Cat issues #339 Sparking Lady details of their next heist, but unknown to them, Badar and friend are listening in through the bugs they had placed, and they intercept Black Cat’s consignment of diamonds worth billions. Lady Boss and Black Cat are not amused—Lady Boss demands her diamonds “By hook and crook.”

Another scheme to poison some potential business partners goes awry as the nosey journalist sabotages the plan. Black Cat is enraged at Lady Boss’s failure and demands the destruction of the entire nation in a petulant rage. Then he informs 339 that he intends to take a break to visit some friends abroad.

Meanwhile, Lady Boss recruits rabble-rouser Shahid for the gang and assigns him to find Badar, the man who has been the cause of so much trauma. Finally, the Lady Boss discovers the

Lady Boss (Pashto) Aka Black Cat bugging devices and destroys them. She eventually manages to capture Badar’s partner and brainwashes him, teaching him that Badar is not his friend but a sworn enemy to be killed at the first opportunity.

Thrown into this mix of bizarre events and characters is the elderly and saintly Lady Rahat, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the Lady Boss but is such a benevolent, good-hearted old lady that everyone thinks the world of her.

Bizarre events unfold, including rape attempts, nefarious brainwashing experiments, evil Playboy Bunnies on the rampage, counterfeit rackets, stunning car stunts and an array of special effects. Events lead to the most shocking climax, unearthing a mind-blowing revelation. The film is a Z-grade budget sub-Bond genre gas from beginning to end. It’s sublimely cheap and inept, which only goes to enhance its cult and charm value. The plot is so ridiculous that it borders on genius, and the acting is horrific at best.

Naghma is superb as the brutal SS Fraulein, like #339 AKA Sparking Lady AKA Lady Boss AKA Lady Rahat; who knows how many personalities she has? The burning question that drives the film is who the dreaded Black Cat is—the Cat that brings horrors to anyone who crosses it. Could it be the saintly Lady Rahat, preposterous a notion though it may seem?

It’s a horrendous film, but so dreadful and inept that it is a bit of a riot. Beware, world; this majestic slice of mind-altering crap unleashes a new cult classic. What further elevates the film above the mundane are its utterly dubious credentials. The film was shot during the peak sleazy years of the mid-‘70s. Unfortunately for the producers, the democratic government was overthrown and replaced. The new pseudo-fundo military regime began to purge society of all ‘obscenity’; thus, the film was no doubt somewhat compromised to get through the new hardline censors.

Black Cat was released in 1977 and sank without much of a trace, leaving theatres within days of its arrival. Eleven years passed before

General Zia died in a plane crash; months later, the country returned to democracy. The producers of this marvelously rotten film decided to try to have a second bite at the cherry, as it were, by resubmitting their film for censorship but giving it a new name: Lady Boss. So, the decade-old film was repackaged and renamed and brought into cinemas in 1988 as a new film called Lady Boss. The audacity and the lack of scruples on the part of the producers are admirable, yet their ingenuity failed miserably. The film was a spectacular flop all over again. No doubt the film proved too sophisticated a product for the cinemagoing audiences. We found it to be vintage tripe!