When i first saw this movie when i was around 8 or so, i found it quite depressing and scary, and not just because of the supposedly 3d horror elements.
I felt the true horror was the exploitation of Chatan at the hands of the magician. Magic wands pointed at the screen didn't scare me as a child.
As an adult now, i can easily see the entrapment of Chatan by the magician as an allegory for child labour and/or pedophilia. You can easily replace the magician with a firecracker factory owner and Chatan with some worker child in Sivakasi.
In the movie, if the magician dies, Chatan dies too. So in real life, the factory stops and owner gets arrested, the child workers will starve too!
I felt the true horror was the exploitation of Chatan at the hands of the magician. Magic wands pointed at the screen didn't scare me as a child.
As an adult now, i can easily see the entrapment of Chatan by the magician as an allegory for child labour and/or pedophilia. You can easily replace the magician with a firecracker factory owner and Chatan with some worker child in Sivakasi.
In the movie, if the magician dies, Chatan dies too. So in real life, the factory stops and owner gets arrested, the child workers will starve too!