Horror Story

By: kitcha on 9:57 PM

When you churn out the same genre again and again, and deliver several successful hits, you naturally raise expectations with every movie you make. So, if your current product is even half a notch lower than your previous film, your audience is going to reject it. And that’s where Horror Story loses its impact.

Vikram Bhatt has been making not only horror movies but successful horror films, in quick succession. His brand (as director or producer) is enough to draw horror lovers to cinema halls. But his movies are instinctively compared to his previous ones and the audience expects a certain standard from him.

Horror Story had good potential to deliver an eerie experience. But it doesn’t have staying power. One reason is, the entire film is restricted to a hotel and once the seven protagonists check in, there’s no one else. Second, although the writing is interesting, it is irksome to watch the seven protagonists visiting the same places again and again.

The film therefore has the same faces throughout. It thus turns into a tedious experience and you lose interest. Also, you fail to understand why the ghost plays hide-and-seek with the hotel guests instead of just killing them in one go. And why does it attack only when the victim is alone? These questions pepper your journey through the film and eventually detach you from the experience.

The film is about seven friends, youngsters, who don’t believe in the paranormal, so they decide to visit a haunted hotel. After checking in, they start witnessing and experiencing some weird stuff and one after another, they start getting killed. How many of them can outwit the spirit and stay alive is what this film is all about.

The film starts very well but, as mentioned earlier, you soon feel the proceedings are repetitive. Sometimes, the youngsters are shown brave and very next moment they are scared. Also, the occasional presence of a nurse is confusing.

But there are some brilliantly executed scenes but, then, that’s the problem – they are only a handful. Also, unlike other Bhatt movies, this film doesn’t have any songs or steamy scenes, which again goes against the taste of horror-lovers.

The debutante director shows his competence but only in a few scenes. Background score, which is so essential to any horror movie, is disappointing. Although the run time of the film is under two hours, editing could have been much better. Dialogue is all right.

Performance-wise, the best among the boys is Hasan Zaidi and among the girls is Nandini Vaid. Karan Kundra is good and so is Ravish Desai. The others are just about okay.

Verdict: Although made on a stipulated budget and with barely any money spent on promotion, the film will still find it tough to recover its investment.