Thamma – review

Director: Aditya Sarpotdar

Release date: 2025

Contains spoilers

It is not the first time we have looked at a vehicle using the Indian betaal but this one certainly grounds itself in the Western vampire, whilst distinguishing itself. It is part of a cinematic universe – the Maddock Horror Comedy Universe, which includes films such as Stree and Bhediya. Bhediya is a take on the werewolf genre and we do get a visitation from the film’s lead werewolf in this.

Alexx O'Nell as Alexander

This does work as a standalone, however, and if I have a gripe it is that it is overly long. Nevertheless, it did hold me for its 2-hour 30-minutes run time. It actually starts in 323BC with an army. My thoughts went to a Roman legion until I realised it was Alexander the Great (Alexx O'Nell) and his forces – Alexander did reach India. Later in the film he is described as an Englishman rather than Macedonian (his blood is still bottled, he does not survive) but nonetheless it is his force that hear noises in the forest and his horse refuses to move forward, when a host of betaal, led by Yakshasan (Nawazuddin Siddiqui), attack.

finding Alok

Cut forward to modern day and Alok Goyal (Ayushmann Khurrana) is a reporter – we see a TV stunt gone wrong that’ll turn him into a meme. He and two co-workers are camping in the wilderness and he’s told his issue is not using Instagram enough and so he marches off into the forest to take a dramatic photo – and is attacked by a bear (the cgi bear was pretty well done). The two coworkers run the other way and he is chased and, eventually, painfully but not fatally mauled. He manages to get into a hiding place.

Alok and Tadaka

The bear seems to be yanked away and a woman, Tadaka (Rashmika Mandanna), looks into his hiding spot. He passes out and she pulls him away. He awakens in a carcass of a crashed airplane, which serves as her home. She promises him that she’ll take him home, once healed, but he shouldn’t leave her makeshift home. Of course, he does and he is hunted through the forest by three male betaal. He is captured, nearly fed to the imprisoned Yakshasan and rescued again by Tadaka. They get to the outskirts of their territory and Tadaka tells him to jump from the cliff they are on (to a passing truck on the road below) but she can go no further as it is forbidden – she doesn’t take much persuasion to go with him. He gets home to his funeral (the film is an action/horror/comedy and so, given the comedy side, he has to convince his father (Paresh Rawal) that he is really him and that involves a mole on his butt).

the bhediya

The film then follows the couple as he slowly learns what she is, their eventual estrangement, his (near) death and her turning him – this is forbidden and means that Yakshasan can be freed, and she take his place in imprisonment. Yakshasan was imprisoned because he insisted on feeding from humans (another forbidden thing) and wants to take over the world. Throw in an interlude with the bhediya (Varun Dhawan) who needs to drink betaal blood to recover his powers – and a side note about the betaal and bhediya ancient animosity and then a finale against Yakshasan.

ready to drink betaal blood

The backstory of the creatures is that the great demon Rakhtbeej was granted by Shiva the boon that each spilt drop of his blood would spawn another one of him. Losing against him the Gods called on the Goddess (presumably Kali) and she fought him but each hit caused him to multiply and so she created the betaal to drink his blood and save the world. The other lore we get is that sunlight is an issue when newly turned, they are near indestructible, they cannot lie (and vamp face when they do), we see Yakshasan turn into smoke as he teleports, there is an affinity with bats and one betaal can drink another to death (we see Yakshasan do that and a spirit/demon version of him appears at his shoulder when he does so). With regards vampires a distinction between them and betaal is made and yet the 'V' word is used fairly often, as is Dracula, and many genre film tropes are used (accidental fang, for comic effect, for instance). Ultimately the pitching of vampire/betaal against werewolf/bhediya is straight out of the vampire playbook.

getting her vamp on

The film looks really nice and Ayushmann Khurrana balances dashing leading man and comic focal point really well. The cgi was well done and there was a tad of a superhero vide to this as sometimes happens with good guy vampire films. Being an Indian film I was expecting music and dance routines. There are only two dances (three if you count the one in the credits) but they are diegetic. There are other musical moments that include montage scenes and perhaps these dragged a little given the running time. Indeed, the running time gave opportunity to expands the characters – though one might argue they were no more expanded than a shorter running time would have allowed for – but it does feel too long. Nevertheless I rather enjoyed this and found it amusing. 6.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

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