Namaslay

by Mike McGranaghan

Namaslay is a horror movie set in and around a yoga studio, so the title is a clever play on words. Unfortunately, the cleverness ends there. This independent production is in extremely short supply of laughs or scares, making its 112-minute running time feel interminable.

Gayatri (Kiru Srikanth) has just moved to Los Angeles. Her friend Judy (Angela Sant’Albano) invites her to come along to a trendy yoga class. She gets a surprise when the owner, Reyna (Christina Moore), invites them to join her training program to lead classes. The opportunity seems too good to pass up, until all the trainees attend Reyna’s retreat, at which point it becomes clear that yoga is not the primary reason for the gathering.

Namaslay doesn’t know what kind of movie it wants to be. The first hour plays like a comedy, hitting the same note – Rayna is weird – over and over again. Absolutely nothing suspenseful or eerie happens. We just watch Gayatri grow continually uncomfortable with her new boss’s quirky, unpredictable behavior. Intermittent flashbacks show a younger Gayatri learning traditional yoga from her grandmother, repeatedly underlining the idea that Rayna is culturally appropriating the practice. None of this is particularly funny or interesting, especially since the film is content to tread water.

Not until the last forty minutes does the horror element actually come into play. Were it not for the abundance of genre cliches, I’d wonder if sibling directors Rish and Kanish Arhant-Sudhir had ever actually seen a horror film. They fail to build tension or any sense of creepiness, instead letting the supernatural elements play out in lethargic fashion. Unconvincing visual effects do the movie no favors in that department.

It’s a shame because the central performances aren’t bad. Kiru Srikanth is appealing onscreen, giving Gayatri a quality we easily sympathize with. Even when stuck with repetitive material, she finds a way to bring various emotions to the role. On her end, Christina Moore makes Rayna eccentric without going so overboard that we can’t stand her. With these two actresses, the potential certainly existed to make a horror-comedy that had some bite.

Namaslay is too unfocused and rambling to make a significant impact, though. The story is thin enough that it could be told in about an hour, meaning the film is twice as long as it needs to be. Lacking a single big laugh or genuine fright, it slogs its way to a predictable conclusion with an equally predictable message about self-empowerment. The seed of a compelling idea is here, but the directors fail to nurture it.