There are bad horror movies, and then there’s Lechmi — a Malayalam “comedy horror” film that’s so confused about what it wants to be, you start to suspect the ghost isn’t haunting the apartment so much as the script. Directed by B.N. Shajeer Sha, Lechmi is that rare cinematic experience that dares to ask: “What if a movie about women’s safety forgot to be about women, safety, or cinema?” The film markets itself as a family entertainer with a “powerful social message.” In reality, it’s 125 minutes of four bachelors, a forgetful ghost, and a holy man with all the charisma of a wilted banana leaf trying to find meaning in a plot that should have been exorcised long before the cameras started rolling. The setup goes like this: four carefree bachelors — Vineeth, Ikku, Stephen, and Sudhi — share an apartment where apparently hygiene and common sense have long since died. Their peaceful (read: directionless) existence takes a turn when a spirit named Lechmi (Parvathy Ratheesh) decides to move in. She’s beautiful, she’s mysterious, and she’s confused — a state that will soon describe the audience as well. Lechmi doesn’t remember who she is, where she came from, or who killed her. Conveniently, neither does the script. What follows is a drawn-out séance of half-baked jokes, supernatural mumbo jumbo, and ghostly feminism so subtle it’s buried deeper than the poor soul she’s supposed to avenge. The bachelors spend most of their time doing what Indian movie bachelors do best: overacting, screaming at shadows, and making jokes that were probably rejected from a 1990s mimicry competition. Somewhere between the haunted mirror and the cheap CGI fog, you start to root for the ghost — not to find peace, but to murder everyone in the cast so we can all go home early. Calling Lechmi a comedy horror is generous. It’s more of a tragic accident in two genres that deserved better. The jokes land with the grace of a falling coconut, and the scares are about as frightening as a mild power outage during Onam. The humor relies on the kind of slapstick where people trip, yell, and stare at each other in slow motion for far too long. The horror relies on jump cuts, dramatic wind noises, and camera filters that look like they were bought in bulk from a YouTube editing tutorial. At one point, a possessed character convulses in what’s supposed to be a terrifying moment — but the sound design makes it feel like he’s choking on a bad punchline. Even the ghost effects look tired, like they’ve been haunting cheaper movies since the 2000s and have finally given up. According to the filmmakers, Lechmi was designed to shed light on “the pressing issues of women’s safety.” That’s noble. The problem is, the film’s idea of empowerment is letting the ghost occasionally yell at men while they ogle her like she’s an item song that learned to float. The irony of four clueless men “helping” a murdered woman find justice is painful enough, but then the script insists on explaining women’s trauma through endless lectures about morality, spirituality, and karma — delivered mostly by the men. If the point was to show that humanity still exists, it’s buried under layers of bad dialogue and tone-deaf messaging. By the time Baba Swami (Biju Sopanam) — the token exorcist and full-time overactor — enters the scene, you’re praying not for divine intervention but for the credits. His wisdom sounds like it was written by ChatGPT on a low battery. He mutters clichés about “souls lost in injustice” while performing rituals that look suspiciously like interpretive dance. Parvathy Ratheesh, to her credit, tries her best to bring dignity to the spectral chaos. Her performance is the only thing tethering Lechmi to the mortal plane of watchability. She plays the ghost with genuine conviction — which makes her scenes opposite the other actors even harder to watch. You can almost see her spirit leaving her body for real every time someone delivers a bad punchline. The movie wants her to be a symbol — a wronged woman seeking truth — but gives her so little to do that she ends up floating around like a forgotten screensaver. There’s no emotional arc, no mystery worth solving, just a slow parade of men arguing about how best to “help” her while she sighs meaningfully into the middle distance. Technically, Lechmi looks like it was filmed during a power shortage. The cinematography is allergic to consistent lighting, the editing feels like it was done by someone exorcising Final Cut Pro, and the sound design has all the subtlety of a temple loudspeaker at 5 AM. The background score refuses to shut up. It roars during comedy, shrieks during romance, and drones during horror — like the composer was determined to use every instrument in his garage at once. At one point, the music swells so dramatically over a shot of a man drinking tea that you wonder if the teacup is about to summon Satan. Even the fight scenes — choreographed by someone named Brucelee Rajesh, which is already a red flag — are unintentionally hilarious. Imagine ghostly slow-motion punches combined with wire stunts so clunky they’d make 1980s Tamil cinema blush. If this is supposed to raise heartbeats, it’s only because you’re laughing too hard to breathe. The filmmakers keep insisting that Lechmi will “create a radical impact on society.” That’s true if the goal was to make people reconsider their life choices for buying a ticket. Its “message about women’s safety” is delivered with all the depth of a school assembly speech — and then drowned out by fart jokes, half-hearted romance, and a ghost that spends more time confused than vengeful. The movie thinks it’s progressive because it has a woman in the title role. But feminism, as it turns out, requires more than floating and crying while men debate your moral purity. The producers proudly called Lechmi “a real family entertainer.” That’s accurate, in the sense that it will unite your family — against you — for making them watch it. It’s the kind of film that makes even your most forgiving aunt say, “We should have watched Chotta Bheem instead.” By the time the credits roll, you don’t remember who Lechmi was, why she was murdered, or why any of this happened. All you know is that your popcorn is gone, your faith in Malayalam horror has been tested, and you’ve learned a valuable lesson about pressing “play” without checking IMDb first. In the end, Lechmi isn’t a horror film, or a comedy, or a feminist statement. It’s a séance of missed opportunities — a ghost story haunted by its own mediocrity. It promises chills and delivers yawns. It claims to uplift women and mostly uplifts male monologues. It tries to make you laugh and instead makes you reconsider your career in film criticism. Rating: 2 out of 10 possessed teacups.The Haunting of the Low Expectations
Four Bachelors and a Funeral for Logic
Comedy, Horror, and Other Missing Persons
A Feminist Ghost Story That Forgot the Feminism
Lechmi Herself Deserved Better
The Horror of Filmmaking Itself
Social Message, Lost in Translation
A Real Family Entertainer (If Your Family Hates You)
Final Verdict: The Exorcism of Audience Interest
One point for Parvathy Ratheesh’s patience. One for the end credits. Everything else should have been left buried where it belonged — in the first draft.
