Saaya
Tags: romantic, haunting, flashback

Plot synopsis:
Akash "Akki" (John Abraham) and his wife Maya (Tara Sharma) are doctors. When malaria strikes India on the Burmese border, pregnant Maya rushes over to help, despite Akki's disapproval. Akash soon receives the news of her death caused by a bus crash. The bus crashed into water at heavy rains.
Akash cannot accept Maya's passing away and believes strongly that she did not die. Akash himself has paranormal experiences where he feels that Maya's ghost is trying to communicate with him. He tries to communicate with her through the hospital patients who have suffered a near-death experience. Every patient draws a strange symbol, and one corpse starts talking to Akash when he is alone. Tanya (Mahima Chaudhry), a close friend of Maya, tries to console Akash, because when her lover died in an accident it was Akash who treated her. Now, she believes it is her turn, and she believes he is hallucinating.
With the help of a nun called Sister Martha and clues, Akash decides to go back to where it all began — the border. There, with the help of a guide, he tries to find out about Maya but is not very successful, following which Akash jumps off a waterfall near the crash site and finds the sunken bus. He sees Maya's spirit beckoning him, and she shows him her accident and the incidents that followed. He goes to the nearby village tribe and asks if they saved Maya. They say she died, but they saved her soul. They take Akash inside and show him a surprise — though Maya died, she gave birth to their daughter. Akash thus realises that Maya was teaching him to trust, because their baby survived among the tribe without any medical attention despite being premature. He also realizes that Maya's spirit was trying to reach him so that he could meet their daughter. He takes their child home and lives happily ever after.

Review: Thoughtful and mature.
So the story goes like this: Akash Bhatnagar (John Abraham; a.k.a Akki) is a doctor who loses his wife Maya (Tara Sharma) in an accident.
Unable to cope with his loss, he begins to see and hear things that convince him that his dead wife is trying to contact him.
His friends, like Tanya (Mahima Chaudhary) try to convince him that his mind is getting affected by the tragedy and advise him to move on with his life.
Nevertheless the strange happenings continue and eventually lead Akash to what his wife was trying to tell him.One of the strongest points of the film is its short running time.
But the beginning of the movie starts out slow and it takes awhile for the viewer to get into the story.
But once in, it keeps you hooked.
The scenes just before and just after the intermission are excellent.
There are some scary scenes, not horror but just unexpected happenings.
Otherwise, Saaya is basically a drama and a good one at that.
Although the story has been copied from Kevin Costner's Dragonfly, it still seems novel when compared to the run of the mill love stories (that we all still love to watch, no matter how overdone).Direction is good.
Screenplay could have used a teeny bit of help but some dialogues were thoughtful, especially the ones about faith.
Music is excellent: dark, brooding, thoughtful and haunting.
Performance wise, Tara Sharma thankfully has a very small role.
Although pretty, she is wooden and impassive.
Mahima Chaudhary in a supporting role is good.
She has this wonderful way of morphing into different roles.
Here she looks very much like the young widow she plays.
Lastly, John Abraham is surprising.
He does well in the complex role of a widower whose faith is questioned.
Of course it doesn't hurt that he is major eye-candy.
I can't wait for his next movie.
There is still room for improvement though..
Saaya - a tribute to eternal love..
Saaya is a movie which is not worth a "Hit" or "Superhit" status.
This movie is a tribute to eternal love.
Full credit goes to the writer Amol Shetge and director Anubhav Sinha.The movie will be cherished and appreciated by all the people in true love.
The performance by John is much beyond words.
Tara Sharma in a brief but most significant role leaves an impact.
But the winner is Anu Malik.
The music is the hero of the film.
Songs being aplenty, are wonderful, melodious and well-suited to the mood of the film.After watching the movie, I really remembered of my girl and thought "Do I love my partner as much as Akki (i.e. John) does?" I really recommend one and all to watch the movie with your loved ones and please do not forward any songs.
If after watching this movie, u start loving your partner more than you do now, then the purpose of writing of this preview is accomplished..
Good work.
An adaptation of the Hollywood movie 'Dragonfly'.
The movie has an okay-okay screenplay, but the movie is saved by the brilliant direction of the mastero, Anurag Basu.
Without a good director, the movie could have been a total mismash, but thank God, it didn't happen!The story is not seen many times, it is kind of story dealing with the connection between 'this world' and 'that world'.
Few loopholes are there in the movie, but not a problem..This is one of the early movies of John Abraham, but he is perfectly fine, without any newcomer feeling.
The show almost belongs to him only, and he handles it well.
His expression was very good in the climax.
Tara Sharma had more song presence, than scenes.
She is alright, but seems uncomfortable in a sequence or two.
Mahima Chaudhary also does a supporting role, she does it well.
Raj Zutshi irritates with his accent...
Zohra Sehgal was good for her role.Songs by Anu Malik are okay, and surprisingly, Shreya Ghoshal appears in a song, as a school girl.
The song is sung by herself, she looks good, and the song too!!On the whole, an average script, made above average with a good direction.
"(Average+Good)/2= Above Average".
Well made version of a Hollywood original.
A very good and well made film.
Another worthy Bollywood copy of a recent Hollywood movie : Dragonfly - starring Kevin Costner (in one of his better roles).
John (Abraham) did well as main lead and supporting cast weren't too bad either.
A worthy recommendation, but Costner's performance made you feel more for the character..
Good supernatural drama/thriller.
John Abraham seems to have matured tremendously since Jism and did a great job.
Mahima, as always, gave a great performance in her short yet noticable role.
The girl opposite John was barely in the movie and didn't make much of a mark.
The ending and theme are also interesting..
Not Only Is It Ripped Off...It's Incredibly Boring.
Anurag Basu's 'Saaya' is almost a scene by scene ripoff of 'Dragonfly'.
Basu has since gained recognition as a hack director.
However, this time, even after being ripped off, 'Saaya' is mind numbingly boring.
It's pretty much about a man grieving his wife's death and Basu has cast one of the worst actors in this role.
Abraham, though less wooden than he usually is, delivers yet another weak performance.
His forced and yet clueless puppy-dog wannabe expressions are quite funny (unintentionally of course).
Tara Sharma is miscast.
Mahima Chaudhry is wasted in a less significant role but she is a scene stealer and acts better than the rest of the cast put together.
Needless to say, she's the only one that acts at all.
The song in the opening sequence has catchy lyrics while the rest of them are forgettable.
The cinematography is sometimes very good but otherwise dull.
Anyway, 'Saaya' is quite a waste and I'd only recommend it if you're having a hard time getting some sleep..
A Beautiful, Emotional, Touching Film!.
I loved this movie!
John Abraham is a very versatile actor, and he really shines through in this movie.
Mahesh and Mukesh Bhatt's collaboration paid dividends, and they really came up with an all-round entertaining production.
The locales are exquisitely beautiful, the music and songs are hauntingly beautiful, and the suspense and scare factor is maintained till the very end.
The science of near-death experiences and the spiritual aspects are dealt with deftly and expertly, and the pace is fast and adequate to maintain the viewers' interest throughout.
The end is heart-wrenching and emotional, and brings a lump to the throat.
Do watch it!.
Dragonfly.
Bhatt films are known for copying films but many times they do come with good stories, SAAYA was the second release of John after Jism(produced by Pooja Bhatt) The film is a remake of Dragonfly.
However there were no bold scenes in the film which normally Bhatt films have The story is like a mix of horror and love story which is well handled.
The film is a bit too slow for Indian audiences but yet the scenes are well handled Director Anurag Basu does a good job handling the film Music by Anu Malik is good, the songs are melidiousJohn Abraham in his second film showed tremendous growth sadly he is hardly known for his acting and people often criticise him, though his voice is dubbed by Viraj and affects his act, but then it's Bhatt tradition to dub their actors in their first few films Tara Sharma is average in a brief role, her voice too is dubbed which is no complain since her voice is horrible Mahima Chaudhary is fab in a small role, sadly she never could make it big, Zohra Sehgal is fab in a small role, she was 90 years in the film in real life Vishwajeet Pradhan is as usual in a brief role, Raj Jhutsi overacts.
Yes it is a scene by scene copy of Dragonfly but....
It has its own uniqueness as well.
It's not as thematically scary as its Hollywood counterpart, but you can always trust the Bhatts to make every steal their own signature.
John Abraham plays Dr. Akash, husband to Tara Sharma's Dr. Maya, both very young and hopelessly in love with a baby on the way.
One day, Maya packs her bags and decides she has to go help the less fortunate in villages that have been ravaged by natural disasters.
Much to Akash's dismay, he begs her not to go but she uses the love card on him and gets her way.
Unfortunately, she dies during a bus accident during a monsoon flood and Akash has to come to terms with this.
Somehow he gets it through his head that Maya is trying to speak to him from beyond the grave and the whole movie from then on is spent trying to prove or disprove his theory.
Mahima Choudry shows up here in the Kathy Bates character from the original movie, only she is a more sexier neighbour than Bates.
Every time she appears on screen with Abraham, you just hope that somehow the Bhatt's wouldn't twist the script up and make Maya slap her from beyond the grave as Tanya (Choudry) has an undeniable sexual chemistry with Akash (Abraham) although this is never explored in the film.
Tanya slaps Akash around a few times but this doesn't help to dissolve the chemistry between them.
In one scene, Akash lashes out at Maya's mum during a dinner that she ought to know that only Maya referred to him as "Akki," yet somehow inexplicably Tanya ends up calling him Akki as well throughout the film.
And even in some scenes, Tanya almost looks like a carbon copy of Maya.
But yet again, this could have just been the Bhatt's trying to mark their own mark on the telling because there was no such possibilities with those two characters in the original movie.
Abraham shines nevertheless as the heartbroken Akash and Choudry in the few scenes that she has, manages to steal them away from the main characters.
Tara Sharma is good too, but her time on screen was just too brief to be a full fledged character.
Her counterpart in the original film had more screen time, but that could be chocked up to the love scenes she (the original character) had to do with Kevin Costner in Dragonfly, which at the time Saaya was shot, such scenes were considered taboo in a mainstream Bollywood film.
I give it 8 out of 10 stars.
It's definitely worth seeing.