Shock Maar (1996)
Cast: Asif Khan, Neanderthal, Shahnaz, Shahid Khan, Sunita Khan
Director: Imran Khan
Synopsis: Twisted version of Tarzan is beyond description. NOT for the squeamish.
Reviewed by: Omar Khan

To endure this gargantuan atrocity is one heck of an achievement, and shows to what lengths reviewers will go to uncover some of the most fascinating retro art ever captured on celluloid. Shock Maar is a beauty in every sense of the word, and it is so amazingly, overpoweringly abysmal that finding words for a fitting description is tough. Yet there are people like John Waters who would be pretty envious of the master directors of the frontier with their ability to plunge into unprecedented levels of smut and sleaze.

All the more remarkable is that these monumental pieces of celluloid smut are a product of what is considered Pakistan’s most pious and conservative belt. It is a region where people think of themselves as the true torchbearers of Islam.

In this turd of a movie, proceedings begin with a group celebrating “Shaadi-wallahs” driving through some rough terrain. Moments later, they are assailed by some fierce bandits who proceed to loot them at gunpoint. Soon a shadowy figure clad in all black arrives to mercilessly spray bullets into the crowd of men, women and children. A mother manages to escape Shock Maar’s horrible execution with her rather doll-like child before being brutally gunned down by the villainous creep. She manages to chuck her child skywards as she dies, but fortunately for her, a friendly Neanderthal happens to be passing by who catches the doll, err, sorry, child and decides to adopt it as its own.

The Neanderthal teaches the child about the ways of the jungle and how to deal with the likes of zebras, tigers, elephants, giraffes, man-eating rubber crocodiles and, of course, lions, who all seem to have migrated from Africa to the outskirts of Peshawar to seek a better and purer life.

It doesn’t take long for the Neanderthal’s adopted child to grow into an incredibly handsome and intensely brave young Tarzan clone. One day, Tarzan comes to the rescue of a busty damsel who escapes from the clutches of the beastly Shock Maar, who was about to have her sent to his pit of writhing king cobras for a bit of fun. Tarzan takes his new lady friend to his treehouse, which must have been reinforced and fortified to withstand her somewhat “healthy” weight.

As in the charming Blue Lagoon, the jungle-bound couple soon begin to feel strange desires entering their midst. Here, the audience is treated to a bevy of songs and situations structured to fascinate with their provocative crudeness. Lots of bum and boob shots, heaving torsos, undulating hips and plenty of flesh on display, and we even get treated to a pretty nausea-inducing mouth-to-mouth epic. That’s not all, though, as the plot toys with incest and then clubs the unsuspecting viewer right between the eyes with a dazzling lesson in sex education.

We have a scene where Jane, who has just spent a night jostling with Tarzan, seen lying in the forest, not is looking too happy with life. We are shown a streak of blood oozing between Jane’s legs, zigzagging down her thigh to her knee. The Neanderthal finds Jane in this state and rushes off to tell Tarzan, who arrives at the scene in a flash. He

Shock Maar then parts her legs and fingers where the blood is oozing. The camera does the usual thing in Pashto cinema: to zoom in on the exposed, fleshy thighs, but this time there is a shocker in store.

Jane wakes up all flushed and embarrassed and tells Tarzan not to mess about. Tarzan still parts her legs once more and points to the blood, at which point Jane gets all coy and whispers to him that the blood means that she has now become a woman. This scene is the highlight of an utterly sordid two-and-a-half hours of gutter-level cinema. The director no doubt felt he was doing a social service by educating the masses about menstruation.

Discussing the movie any further would be flattering, as it doesn’t deserve even this much attention. However, one enormously exciting scene is when our bulbous beauty strips off and takes a dip in the local lagoon, only to have the mischievous Neanderthal hide her clothes. Noticing the unclad beauty, a basking rubber crocodile suddenly develops an insatiable, lustful appetite. An attack scene follows, more terrifying than anything witnessed in Jaws, as the rubber croc, lips (!) glistening in the midday sun, menaces the young babe. She shrieks for help and tries sensibly to scare off the croc by exposing herself to it. Tarzan’s timely arrival and death-defying battle against all odds saves the day, as he ravages the marauding croc, deflates the animal, and brings it down to size. They later eat the unfortunate and somewhat deflated latex beast as a snack between jostling.

Horrendous as it is, this film is an excellent specimen to illustrate the massive double standards in Pakistan. It is astounding that films like these are produced within Pakistan for consumption by the general public, including women and children. It’s not so offensive that such filth is churned out for the adoring masses, but far more offensive that the same people who create and watch this muck are always the first to point offending fingers both east and westwards for their “morally corruptive” influence.

Sleaze is alive and well and thriving in Pakistan. Unfortunately, common sense and pragmatism are not. This movie is pitiful in every way, yet it is valuable in showing society its schizophrenic reflection. Shock Maar is a pathetic piece of garbage—tragic and sad but unmissable for devotees of the finest smut.