The film was premiered in the Marché du Film section of the 2005 Cannes Film Festival.[6][7] Released theatrically on 20 May 2005, Nainaflopped at the box office, grossing ₹6.94 crore against a ₹5 crore budget.[1] It was also controversial because its depiction of the protagonist seeing ghosts after receiving a corneal transplantation was similar to existing fears in India surrounding corneal transplants and it was feared the film would discourage people from donating corneas or seeking corneal transplants.[8][9][10]
Plot
During a solar eclipse in 1986, young Naina Shah, while traveling in the backseat of her England-based dad's car, is struck by glass from the shattered windshield during an accident and loses her eyesight. Her parents do not survive, and she is brought up by her paternal grandmother. Years later, Naina gets a successful corneal transplant and is able to see. She complains of vision problems, seeing hooded persons, and people dying, which a psychiatrist, Samir Patel, diagnoses as hallucinations. But when Naina reports seeing someone else in her mirror reflection, Sameer decides to investigate who the original cornea actually belonged to. This investigation will lead them to an impoverished village in New Bhuj, Gujarat, where she will find her life endangered by hostile villagers who believe that the donor of her cornea was cursed.
Naina learns the story of her donor, Khemi. Khemi was born with the ability to see a person's imminent death and was ostracised by society. One night, she tried to save the village from a great fire, but nobody believed her. After the fire broke out, those same villagers blamed Khemi for the disaster. Khemi committed suicide out of despair. Naina returns to England, where she unsuccessfully tries to save people from fire. In the accident, Naina once again loses her eyesight, but she does not regret it because she has the love of Samir and her grandmother.
Narbir Gosal from Planet Bollywood gave the film an 8/10 rating, labeling it an original story mixing the paranormal ideas from The Sixth Sense and The Eye, and praising the technical aspects.[11]Taran Adarsh from Bollywood Hungama gave the film 3 stars out of 5, calling it "one of the most imaginative and pulse-pounding horror films to come along in recent times."[12]
On the other hand, Sukanya Verma from Rediff.com praised Matondkar's performance and the absence of songs, but felt the film failed to "establish an emotional connection" and instead went on a "melodrama spree" which ruined the fear factor.[3]
Box office
The film was a financial disappointment, earning ₹6.94 crore against a ₹5 crore budget.[1]
Notes
^Multiple reviewers have pointed out that the film is identical to The Eye while director Morakhia has completely denied this, making it an unofficial adaptation.
^ ab"Naina, all blood and gore, is a bore". Rediff.com. Retrieved 20 May 2005. Two scenes later, however, it becomes a tacky scene-to-scene reproduction of the Chinese supernatural hit, Jian Gui aka The Eye [...] The entire girl-in-a-raincoat sub-plot is conveniently borrowed from Hideo Nakata's Japanese horror, Honogurai Mizu No Soko Kara, aka Dark Water.
^"Naina isn't a copy: Shripal Morakhia". Nowrunning.com. Retrieved 22 May 2005. He's even more stupefied by the premature assessments that his film is a "scene by scene" remake of the Chinese film The Eye [...] But to say that Naina is a remake of any one particular film is completely wrong. This is my own film, and that's the way I want to see it.
