This film earned itself a notorious reputation when its censors certificate was withdrawn quite suddenly as the new military government tried to look smart and appease the fundo's way back in the glory days of the mid to late 70's - but this was only after the film had already enjoyed a massively successful run at the Box Office in Lahore even if business in Karachi was tame. However despite the subsequent ban, it seems everyone has seen the film with all its legendary saucy numbers and bed scene (that got the film into hot water) totally intact.

The film itself is the usual revenge bloodbath and is disappointingly predictable till the very end. It begins by informing the audience that the story of Khatarnaak is inspired by the famous American novel The Lone Star Ranger, though it doesn't mention the author. We have reformed criminal Bahadur (Yousuf Khan) being let out of prison by a kindly jailor sahib. He heads home to gushing mother (Seema - the one Shahid had a raging affair with) and doting father who are delighted that their son has given up the ways of violence and is now ready to walk on the right side of the law. However the new peace loving, non-violent Bahadur becomes the laughing stock of the town and his peers mock him for his passivity. To add insult to injury, the village beauty Neelo finds that he is hardly the prince charming she had expected and she also proceeds to bully and taunt the poor sod.

Bahadur becomes depressed and threatens to leave for the city for a clerical job but his father persuades him to stay by recounting his own experience with crime. Years ago, when Bahadur was a mere tot, his father had tried to rob a bank with four other cronies. The heist went bad and the robbers including Bahadur's dad ended up in jail. However, the jailor offered Bahadur's dad amnesty and a future with his wife and child if he grassed on his mates. The offer proves too tempting but as Bahadur's father walked away from prison to his freedom, Mustafa Qureshi warned him of the dire consequences of snitching against the gang………death, if not worse!

It doesn't take long for the gang to escape from prison and they head straight for a nightclub where they team up with their shapely accomplice Miss Tina (Anita) who happens to be a deadly part time Ninja. She welcomes them home like all good friends would with one of the voluptuously lewd dances that got the film slapped with a ban all those years ago…….a sizzlingly filthy dance to Mala's sultry, breathy number which goes "we kar, we kar, we kar…….pyar menoon kar". The opening shot of Anita is spectacularly disorienting - from below her legs……..so that her crotch is the focal point, and from below at that! No wonder the film was banned, it's mucho sleazy!

Anita shows why that her presence in a film guarantees an element of raunch to the adoring, thirsting masses. It is difficult to recall someone so adept at the sublimely vulgar Lollywood club dance. Mustafa Qureshi's murderous gang wreaks havoc on Bahadur's village leaving both parents dead. Bahadur finally throws off the shackles of his limp-wristed passivity and vows revenge on Qureshi and his gang - very much the usual Lollywood scenario.

The film suffers from uneven pacing and is overlong in getting to its inevitable conclusion. Yousuf Khan appears worn out and old….he was in his twentieth year of acting as a hero in 1974, and is still going strong in 2001, bless him. He does fairly well as the mild mannered Bahadur who has to toughen up and live up to his name. Mustafa Qureshi is one of Pakistan's truly wonderful actors. He has a tremendous screen presence and is able to electrify scenes with his mere presence. Of course he needs the stage on which to perform his wonderful antics, as well as a suitable adversary which this movie isn't perhaps able to provide. There are few in the world of cinema who slip into the role of a deranged personality with the ease that he does, and exude the menace that he manages to ooze.

Neelo doesn't have much to do except look pretty, and bat her eyelids. She accomplishes both tasks with considerable ease, but her dialogue delivery in dramatic scenes is just so overwrought it grates. But then the word subtle doesn't exist within the realm of Punjabi cinema. That said, Neelo was nominated and ended up winning the Nigar Award as Best Actress in a Punjabi movie for the year!

Nanna does his thing and Afzal Ahmed is in top form. He shares a spectacular scene where the sexual energy between him and Miss Tina proves overwhelming and they have no option but to give in to their lust……we see both of them head to the bed where they start to disrobe. We then see them slip under the sheet and various articles of clothing are discarded from within! Then the audience is treated to the sight of jostling going on beneath the sheet until the scene is rudely interrupted by a phone call. Another highly risqué scene from this infamous movie which has another two or three ultra sleazy cheap dances replete with gyrations and camera angles Alfred Hitchcock could never have dreamed of. To his credit, director Rehmat Ali is able to somehow infuse a sense of intensity and raw power with his gritty black and white cinematography and frenetic, almost creative camerawork (Cameraman Masood-ur-Rehman- Faisal Rehman's father). Likewise the editing is precise and keeps things rolling along rather than the laborious, plodding norm. There is a certain creative energy to proceedings here - mostly in the camerwork, the lighting and the editing departments. The same team followed up the massively successful Khatarnaak with a follow up entitled Khaufnaak with many of the same ingredients as their original smash.

The sleazy dances (We Neray Neray Aa and Touch me Not) allow numerous opportunities for the camera man to snatch ample glimpses of the dancers' skivvies, a favourite pastime of the local directors, and no doubt audiences appreciate their efforts, we certainly do. On the whole the movie is not much to write home about, but the sleaze factor is way up there with the best and the film will remain in memory for those wonderfully frightening camera angles and the fabulous tantalizing undie shots…..and the epic bed scene. You may need smelling salts just in case some unwary family member accidentally happens to watch this!