Khamosh

Khamosh is 1985 Indian thriller directed and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra. The film starred Bollywood actors such as Naseerudin Shah, Shabana Azmi, Amol Palekar, Soni Razdan and Pankaj Kapoor. It, however, did not do well at the box office.

The film became notable for actors Amol Palekar, Soni Razdan and Shabana Azmi portraying themselves. It is a suspense movie, where in he murderer is among the group of people living together in a hotel, and the actual murderer is well hidden in the plot till the very end.

Plot

Soni Razdan is Naseeruddin Shah's sister and a budding actress. Shah is a military man. Amol Palekar is an established actor. Shabana Azmi is a fellow actress and a sleepwalker. Ajit Vachani is film producer and Pankaj Kapoor is his mentally unstable brother. Sushma Seth plays Mrs.Bhal, a character actress.

The filming unit enters Pahalgam in Kashmir for their next film. Razdan mysteriously commits suicide. The police are about to wrap the case when Shah enters the scene. He pretends in front of the unit that he is a special officer sent to investigate the death, but his cover blows off when police come. Shah reveals his true identity and states that some days before the "suicide", Razdan had sent him a letter that she has bagged the lead role for a prestigious project. As such, he refuses to believe that she committed suicide. The crew accept that Razdan had indeed got the coveted role, but they are less enthusiastic about co-operating now.

The only person who believes that Razdan was murdered is Azmi, who heard the latter practising her lines till late night. Azmi realises that Razdan was portraying a village girl, and that she suddenly started shouting something in English before she became silent. The duo joins hands to nab the culprit, and the head count starts increasing.

Finally, all clues point to Vachchani, who confesses that Kapoor killed Razdan in a rage when the latter spurned his advances. Vachchani confesses that he was just cleaning up, while his brother was the killer. Kapoor goes on a shooting spree, killing Vachchani in the process. The case is about to be wrapped up when Shah realizes two things : 1] Kapoor's revolver had already been emptied before he "shot" his brother dead. 2] Vachchani had posted a mysterious letter to someone, but nothing came up about it.

Azmi promises to try to find the gun, while Shah goes to post office to retrieve the letter. Azmi finds the gun along the props & costumes. It is then revealed that Palekar is the real killer. On the other hand, Shah discovers the same thing in Vachchani's letter, which turns out to be his confession.

Palekar explains Azmi that Razdan was pregnant with his child, so he bumped her off. Vachchani was his accompolice, and did everything to cover up. He killed others as they would not shut up and now that Azmi knows too much, she will suffer an accident due to her "sleepwalking". Shah enters the scene just in time before Azmi is about to get killed. Shah shoots Palekar to death.

External links

• Khamosh at the Internet Movie Database