New Bollywood horror film Dobaara (See Your Evil) is currently entertaining audiences across the region. Directed by Prawaal Raman and starring Huma Qureshi and Saqeeb Saleem, the film had its premiere in Mumbai recently, with Dubai-based singer Neha Pandey on hand to share some of the limelight.
While Pandey doesn't actually appear in the movie, she is making her Bollywood music debut on the film soundtrack with her haunting number Humdard, a collaboration with rapper Parry G and Arko. Pandey has been noticing the benefits of her new-found fame here in the UAE. "I think the UAE can be quite blinded by celebrity. You have to be in Hollywood or Bollywood to be noticed here," she says.
“I’ve really noticed that people have started paying me a lot more attention since this movie happened, whereas before even though I was on TV it was much less ... I’ve suddenly started getting lots of enquiries since the Bollywood connection came in.”
The previous television appearance Pandey is referring to is the accompanying video to her hit Na Roko, which was aired last year on MTV in the Middle East and India. She believes the song's success played a crucial factor in landing her the Bollywood soundtrack gig.
“I got a call from a couple of Bollywood movie directors that had heard the song on MTV and liked it, and got in touch,” she explains. “I think I’m the first UAE artist to feature in a Bollywood movie.
The song certainly isn't your typical Bollywood fare, but then Dobaara isn't your typical Bollywood movie, as Pandey notes: "It's not your usual masala movie, and horrors have quite a selective audience, so you won't find any dancing girls in the background."
Appropriately, then, Humdard roughly translates as 'someone who feels your pain', and it does have a certain melancholy feel to it, though Pandey insists it isn't too downcast. "It's quite an emotional song, though it has streaks of positivity," she insists.
Pandey says she's already in talks with other Bollywood directors about contributing to other soundtracks. She may well be on the way to being the next big Bollywood music star, and with Dobaara she can lay a tenuous claim to Hollywood stardom by association, too. Dobaara is an official remake of Mike Flanagan's 2013 hit Oculus, the tale of two bereaved siblings and a cursed mirror. "I haven't seen Oculus, but I suppose I should," she says. "I generally stay away from horror in particular, and I'm not really into movies as much as music, but I do find horror movies usually have the best music, so maybe I should give it a try."
• Dobaara is in cinemas now. The official video for Humdard should be out on television next week
cnewbould@thenational.ae
