Miss Cleopatra (1990)
Cast: Babra Sharif, Sultan Rahi, Ghulam Mohiuddin
Director: Javed Fazil
Synopsis: Typical Revenge Pot-boiler invigorated by bizarre possession sub-plot. Known as Pakistan’s version of The Exorcist.
Reviewed by: Omar Khan

Historical epics have been a rare commodity in Lollywood over the years. Still, this intriguingly titled Punjabi film starring Babra Sharif, Sultan Rahi and Ghulam Mohiuddin promised a mouthwatering treat judging by the majestic VCD cover.

The film is set in present-day Pakistan, where a naval officer has taken his wife and two daughters to the harbor. They are aboard a ship when some nasty anti-state types suddenly show up and proceed to create mayhem by shooting indiscriminately into the helpless crowd. The good naval officer is gunned down in cold blood by the dastardly villain, who then snatches one of the infant daughters, claiming she might be useful in the future. Then the villain escapes to the safety of his den, soon to be told of a snitch who turns out to be a poor village fisherman. The villain hunts down the fisherman and guns him down brutally in front of his young son—who soon grows up with a vengeance burning in his eyes as a paunchy 60-year-old young man, Ibra (Sultan Rahi).

Ibra is known in the local community as an oddity yet fiercely honest and a sort of people’s “Superman”. Ghulam Mohiuddin is the local police officer whose right-hand woman is the perky, busty beauty Miss Kiran Khan, who secretly admires Sultan Rahi’s heroics and is prone to dozing off at work, daydreaming lustful thoughts. Things progress in a typical masala style until suddenly, totally out of the blue, a bizarre subplot is inserted into proceedings, seemingly just for the hell of it.

One fine evening, Tina has a dance performance somewhere and is kitted out as Cleopatra. Somehow, it all goes woefully wrong. She accidentally awakens the sleeping spirit of Marc Anthony (called Rafin in this instance), who begins to stalk her as believing she is his Cleopatra, torn away from him centuries ago. Now it is time to reclaim her. So Rafin, dressed as though he has just walked off the set of a Tarzan movie, starts to terrorize Cleopatra into submission. When she still refuses to accept that she is the reincarnation of Cleopatra, Rafin possesses her body and makes her do strange things, such as speaking in a booming masculine Punjabi voice. She also acquires the strength of ten Sultan Rahis, throwing large pieces of furniture around the house as though they were merely feathers. She also takes to pacing up and down frantically upside down from the ceiling.

Babra’s old mother is perplexed at her daughter Tina’s odd behavior. Eventually, a holy man is sent to perform an exorcism that turns foul, as Tina/Cleopatra turns the tables on the old bean. She sends a large syringe hurtling through the air like a guided missile to inject him lethally in the bum, and turns him into a flaming female impersonator. It is mind-boggling stuff, even by Lollywood standards. Who could be better at playing a demented, demonically possessed, mad thing than the great Babra Sharif? The actor often appeared demonically possessed in almost all her films. Here, she can tuck into her role and do what she does best: act like a deranged imp.

Later, there are spectacular levitation scenes and then a magnificent head-spinning scene that makes The Exorcist appear like an episode of Rainbow— (Though I find Rainbow’s Bungle rather more disturbing than The Exorcist). Meanwhile, the other sister has turned into a super-criminal under the tutelage of our master villain. Eventually, all such unfortunate matters are sorted out, thanks to sheer brilliance and good fortune. In an intriguing subplot, though, an epic

Miss Cleopatra battle was expected to rid Tina of the shadow of Miss Cleopatra—it seems the strain of speaking in Punjabi finally gets the better of the demonic spirit. She relents rather meekly, allowing the She-Imp to re-emerge as Tina, the demented dwarf-let, soon to be the wife of Police Inspector Ghulam Mohiuddin. Life is a bed of roses soon enough.

I had been informed that Miss Cleopatra was a Pakistani version of The Exorcist, and I wondered how this could have existed without my knowledge for so long. I got my hands on a copy and threw it on at 1 a.m., absolutely intrigued by the prospect of watching a Punjabi version of The Exorcist. Sadly, the film is far from an Exorcist rip-off that I was hoping for, but just another Punjabi revenge masala flick. Yet it did contain a comic/horror subplot that involves Babra Sharif being possessed by the spirit of Cleopatra, and the ensuing mayhem that follows is indeed classic Lollywood genius.