Haseena Atom Bomb (1990)

Haseena Atom Bomb, AKA Atom Bomb, became a nationwide craze in the early 90s shortly after its release—and it is not too difficult to understand why. The film is nothing less than a significant work of art. Its director was immediately elevated to the ranks of John Waters and Russ Meyer, Herschel Gordon Lewis, Paul Naschy and other masters of gutter-trash-art. It is a breathtaking slice of the bizarre and the macabre, as well as a searing socio-political indictment and commentary on a society gone haywire. Haseena Atom Bomb is one of the few great movies that emanated from the subcontinent in many a decade and deserved to be admired by a much wider audience.

The movie became such a craze that its producers had to oblige a thirsting nation with dubbed versions so that the epic masterpiece could be appreciated by those unfortunate souls not fluent in Pashto—the language of the gods. Not only that, but the film’s profound philosophical commentary needed to be understood by everyone and not only Pushto speakers. The dubbed versions arrived as a major blessing, and a very sound business decision as Haseena Atom Bomb went on to conquer the Box-Office all-over Pakistan. Subsequently, overseas Video distributors raced to be the first to release it in lucrative markets like London, New York, Cannes and Kabul.

Haseena Atom Bomb starts with a blistering dance number belted out by the evergreen Madame Noor Jehan, AKA Malka-e-Tarannum, AKA Melody Queen, if not beauty queen. The poetic number has a crescendo line that goes, “main hoon, main hoon Haseena Atom Bomb” at which point the director has inserted some astounding and thrilling shots of a volcanic eruption, no doubt culled from some National Geographic video! No doubt, he deliberately used a volcanic eruption rather than an actual Atomic Bomb to equate the potency of the bomb with the destructive power of nature. It would have been far too simple and crude to merely show Atom Bombs exploding when the singer goes “Atom Bump”. Much more subtle and indeed symbolic to show Volcanoes instead.

The sizzling dance number by our country’s future leader (wishful thinking?) is no less than blinding by its sheer dazzle and oomph. The choreographer and dress designer must be congratulated for putting together a sequence that is a veritable showstopper, and that too, in the movie’s opening moments.

Atomic completes her rollicking dance number, “Main hoon Haseena Atom Bump” and goes off through the woods and fields on her way home. It is her wedding day, so she seizes the moment like any sensible girl and jumps into the nearest stream for a quick wash—naturally fully clothed.

While our naive beauty is frolicking in the stream little known to her, she has attracted an audience of despicable hoodlums who bathe on the service road beside FC College in Lahore. The nasty goons are about to descend on our hapless and compromised beauty, who has since mysteriously slipped from her disco clothes into hejab. A handsome, dashing, if slightly overweight young man on a puny white horse comes to her rescue. A few aerial stunts and repeat kicks soon have the goons running gingerly for cover, with their “animal lust” yet to be satisfied.

Meanwhile, we are shown various flashbacks to establish the credentials of some of the characters and explain why they are, erm, the way they are. One scene, enacted with “Dentonic” precision by the children involved, is memorable as the two kids start arguing and pull each other’s hair virtually off their scalps. It is a bizarre episode followed by a twisted scene of patricide as a tot gets pissed off with dad for selling “poh-durr” (heroin). He grabs his favourite tape-ball bat, and in a brilliant imitation of Inzamam Ul Haq, he square cuts his errant father to death in a surge of raw moral duty. A late cut, if ever there was!

This pseudo-idyllic community of earnest, simple folk is tormented by the local goons who control things with a Stalinesque Iron fist and have a strange sense of justice and virtue. But then, don’t we all?

The film switches back to the present. Atomic, having been rescued by Tubby on the emaciated Pegasus clone, skips off homeward to enjoy her wedding to local stud, Cool Joe and village law enforcer, who is one hell of a fellow. He also goes for white when it comes to transport—the four-legged kind. Just as the marriage is about to be consummated, the bliss is shattered as the vengeful goons thrashed by Tubby return to satisfy their “animal lust”. You must at least give them some credit for their persistence.

The gang rape scene that follows is memorable for being amazingly gratuitous and endlessly long but was deemed suitable for general viewing by the censors—that includes children. Poor Atomic’s husband is forced to watch helplessly as each low-life goon assaults her repeatedly. After a brief but delightful fight sequence, the husband is left dangling perilously by a rope from the ceiling. The only support he has momentarily is the shoulders of Atomic, but she is hardly in any condition to prop him up after being gang raped, and it is not long before she decides she has had enough of standing up. The husband is left dangling for two-thirds of the movie because Atomic returns to talk to the festering corpse whenever she feels the need for a friendly face to talk to or keep him updated on how she is progressing on her mission of vengeance.

Her life does indeed acquire a mission; this is where the movie veers directly into I Spit on Your Grave territory. Atomic transforms from a purdah-wearing bombshell and dutiful wife to a hardened but ferociously dedicated crime-fighting vigilante type. The rest of the movie tells the story of Haseena exacting miserable revenge on those goons who shattered her existence.

We are treated to a series of scintillating and voluptuous dance numbers where Mussarat Shaheen adequately displays why she was Pin Up girl number 1 in the NWFP throughout the 80s. The makeup man must have gone through crates of material as there is no single shot of Atomic looking like anything less than divinely gorgeous, with cascading colours leaping out from every angle of her very shapely form. The dress designer has come up with creations that would be the envy of every Parisian Catwalk, but the models would have to be as alluring as our Mussy, which would be nigh impossible.

The film is a surreal sort of heady, dizzying mixture with the most sublime ingredients and a moral as bewildered as the society that spawned it. The scenes where giant syringes are used to drain the blood out of some drug-dealing thugs are pure cinematic art. The symbolism of using these giant syringes to pulverise the nasty heroin pushers is something that only a director of the most remarkable insight, vision and intelligence could have conceived.

The cameraman has a slight propensity for zeroing in on various parts of the female anatomy. I do not think you need to be told precisely where the focus tends to linger ever so often. Then we are treated to the tasteful usage of the zoom lens to create that subtle “in-out” effect—delicate, serene beauty. We are so glad the censors saw the sheer beauty of the several sizzling dance numbers, all belted out by Madame Noor Jehan.

Many dialogues are laced with crude undercurrents and double entendres—tactics that have been fine-tuned to an art so that smut can thrive within our “strict code” of censorship.

Watching this classic tale of post-feminist social-political backlash is a fantastic, elevating, enlightening, and culturally enriching experience.

Mussarat Shaheen in the title role is a knockout, and if the film were to be re-released a month or so before the elections, then we all know who the landslide winner would be. What a talent, what a bombshell! What a Movie!

Very clearly a work of inspired genius. If there were one criticism, it would be that the film is too short at 2 hours and 20 minutes and could have been done with an additional 20 minutes or so—trash art at its unbeatable best.

News Flash: We just completed viewing a Pushto film called ATOM BOMB which turned out to be Haseena Atom Bomb in its original Pushto version. The film is almost identical to the nationwide Urdu dubbed version. Still, tellingly, the rape scene is significantly more prolonged and gratuitous, complete with creaking springs and the mattress bobbing up and down.