On a dark, stormy night a shining black Padmini slowly and mysteriously rises up from a dark bog in the middle of nowhere slowly emerging onto land revving its engines in a maniacal rage. The devilish, driverless Padmini takes to the roads menacingly with a black cat as its only occupant looking on in a very perplexed manner.

The car rams and menaces some innocent travellers who scamper off in terror meanwhile in a nearby town a square jawed young lad wearing a pancake of make up spots the girl of his dreams and once smitten, pursues her like a madman. After much persistent effort a romance blossoms but later in a shocking turn of events it is revealed that the young lad is actually romancing a ghost – the disgruntled spirit of a wronged (white sari clad) woman who is using the Cat who is using the Padmini as her terrible instrument of revenge. All is revealed in a wonderfully convoluted ending though it is more than a bit of an anticlimax when the Black Cat’s Devil Car meekly surrenders at the mere brandishing of a cross by a local Padre.

The film is not one of Baby’s best probably because the plot is largely borrowed rather than an indigenous one. Eliot Silverstein’s cheap B-movie horror flick “The Car” is the inspiration for this Indianized version though having said that the film suffers because its not indigenous the fact is that the bits involving the rather benign looking Black Padmini as it revs its engine in demonic rage are the most effective scenes in the film. Secondly, after a promising start, the film never manages to get past second gear and the second half, when the car doesn’t have much to do, falters and flounders quite badly.

To his credit at least Baby is attempting something novel (for local audiences) rather than rehashing the same old Exorcist-Evil Dead-Omen scenario and thankfully never for a moment does he resort to using the cheap rubber mask type props that seem to be the norm these days. Baby hasn’t been able to conjure the imaginative scenes that one has come to associate with him especially after his work in House No.13. This film is lacking in effective horror sequences, not gripping enough and subsequently far from being a compelling viewing experience. Ultimately Khooni Aankhen is a film that promised much but doesn’t manage to deliver.