Sara Ali Khan plays an enigmatic heiress in Disney+ Hotstar’s Gaslight, an upcoming Indian mystery movie that got a first trailer on Tuesday. When the heiress, a paraplegic young woman named Meesha, returns to her palatial family estate after over a decade, she finds that her father, the “Raja (king)” is missing. The plot thickens as Meesha begins to suspect that her step-mother Rukmini (Chitrangada Singh) and her father’s aide, a man named Kapil (Vikrant Massey), might have something to do with his disappearance.

Gaslit into believing that her father is away for a few days, Meesha is shocked when she sees him in the house one night. But before she can alert anybody, he disappears again. A policeman played by Rahul Dev asks her a valid question the next day: “You say that you saw Raja Saheb in the night. If you saw him, then how is he missing? And if he is missing, who did you see?”

Eventually, Meesha comes to the gutting realization that her father, the man who summoned her home, has been murdered. A lake is drained, suspects are interrogated, flashlights are waved around in the dark as the investigation unfolds. At one point, Meesha appears to discover a notebook filled with scary drawings, and later, we see Rukmini firing a gun at somebody. The trailer makes Gaslight seem like a cross between an old Alfred Hitchcock movie and a contemporary Conjuring film.

Sara Ali Khan and Chitrangada Singh in Gaslight Trailer
Image via Hotstar

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Khan’s casting as a princess-adjacent character is sort of meta. She’s the daughter of Bollywood star Saif Ali Khan, who belongs to the North Indian royal family of Pataudi. Khan made her film debut in only a few years ago, and has already established herself as one of her generation’s brightest young stars. Although she is coming off of two critically reviled films — Love Aaj Kal and Coolie No. 1 — and Atrangi Re, a drama that was unceremoniously dumped on streaming in 2021.

'Gaslight' Has an Impressive Team Behind It

Gaslight is her third streaming release, following Coolie No. 1 on Prime Video, and Atrangi Re on Disney+ Hotstar. She’ll stick to streaming with her next release, the period drama Ae Watan Mere Watan, also on Prime Video. The well-regarded Massey is no stranger to streaming either; the actor has previously starred in films such as Cargo, Dolly Kitty Aur Woh Chamakte Sitare, Ginny Weds Sunny and Haseen Dillruba, all for Netflix, and in the ZEE5 films 14 Phere, Forensic and Love Hostel.

Directed by Pavan Kirpalani, who worked with Khan’s father on the horror comedy Bhoot Police, Gaslight will be released on Disney+ Hotstar on March 31. You can watch the trailer here, and stay tuned to Collider for more updates.