KARACHI:

Without question, Deemak is the most divisive Pakistani release of the year. For those who still invoke “support local cinema” regardless of a film’s craft or coherence, this is perhaps the moment they’ve been waiting for. A harsher critique of director Rafay Rashdi’s horror-family drama might be too easy — were it not for the sobering state of Pakistani cinema.

When the only local competition is a film like Love Guru , hopes for a lively Eidul Azha at the movies are already dim. If audiences are weary of seeing Humayun Saeed and Mahira Khan replay the same formulas Hollywood created and Bollywood retired, Deemak is at least a departure. Rashdi deserves credit for venturing into a genre still novel in Pakistan’s mainstream — psychological horror — and for roping in A-liste

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