Starring: Saif Ali Khan, Urmila Matondkar, Seema Biswas, Ravi Kale, Pratima Kazmi, Madan Joshi and Aditya Srivastava Screenplay: Pooja Ladha Surti Art Direction: Shyam De Action: Yusuf Khan Audiography: Madhu Apsara, Dwarak Warrier Editing:Sanjib Dutta Cinematography: CK Muraleedharan Music: Amar Mohile Executive Producer: RR Venkat Rao Produced by: Ram Gopal Varma Directed by: Sriram Raghavan

A cracking first half, a director sure of his filmmaking craft, a great performance from Saif Ali Khan make Ek Hasina Thi one of the more interesting films that one is likely to see in the Hindi Mainstream Industry. But what stops an eminently watchable film from being a blistering, dark edge of the seat thriller that it should have been is that old, old nemisis of the Hindi commercial film - its screenplay. Debutant Director Sriram Raghavan is let down by a screenplay that sets up the plot and conflict effieciently enough but unfortunately totally derails in its second half as the film moves towards its conclusion.

The pacy pre-interval lures you into the world of Sarika (Urmila), a single working girl girl in Mumbai. Whereas a normal Hindi film is painfully berefit of events in the first half with the film normally starting in the second half, Ek Hasina Thi speeds off the starting block as Sarika meets a suave charmer Karan (Saif) who sweeps her off her feet, sets her up gets her jailed, her realization in jail that he just used her and her hardening up in the rigours of prison life - all this pre-interval! The second half deals with her escape from jail and of course her revenge!

Among the highlights of the film - the clever use of rats, the scenes in the prison in particular the scene where Sarika's parents come to meet her, the escape from the prison - brilliantly executed, a good feel for locales and of course a perfectly apt diabolocal performance from Saif Ali Khan as a smooth bastard.

The relationship that initially develops between Urmila and Saif while treated well with some well written snappy scenes moves forward a little too fast and while you readily buy her getting lured by him, you do not buy her being so stupid so as to take the blame herself for his underworld misdeeds and going to jail for him. Also, it is a mite too convenient that the first time itself something untoward happens, Sarika gets caught by the cops. There might have been an interesting development if Saif used her and she unwittingingly does his work a couple of times before getting caught. But these are minor snags in a first half that sucks you into the film and makes you move along with it - something not many Hindi films can boast of.

The bigger problems present themselves in the second half - the revenge. Firstly if Sarika wants Karan set up with the underworld why is she after him personally too? And neither is her setting up or executing her plan very clever or credible. (like the entry into Billal's bungalow - is it so easy to climb walls, slip past the security and kill a man - that too a key underworld figure?) Speaking of easy how does she, an escaped convict, walk about Delhi so freely? Also, the film does an abrupt about switch in suddenly opening up the story and giving us Saif's POV which takes away from the plotline and makes the second half clumsy and confused. And though a tantalizing cat-n-mouse situation is set up when Saif is in deep trouble with the underworld and gets a clue that it is Urmila who has set him up and he faces her now, it disappontingly fizzles out without attaining any great heights.

Urmila gives the role all she's got and though one of her better performances, she can't escape the fact that she is 'acting' whereas Saif sails through his role. Be it the charmer, the manupilator or the spiteful rogue, he's spot on. Good support in paricular from Pratima Kazmi as a female don running her operations from within the prison, Aditya Srivastva as a slimy lawyer who pretends to be on Sarika's side but is really Saif's man and sees her convicted and Seema Biswas as a tough female cop who seems to understand the whole situation. This was a track that could have been used well in the story but again is set up and wasted away in some silly shootouts in Delhi. Technical support - cinematography, sound design, editing is efficient.

Incidentally the last couple of months have been good for the FTII alumni with the release of Raj Kumar Hirani's Munnabhai MBBS and now Ek Hasina Thi. Both passed out of the FTII in 1987 and one hopes for more films coming from the younger directors who have come out of the FTII especially now that the Filmmaking Industry is opening up with more and more different types of films getting made.