Vaastu Shastra: A changing facade of Indian Horror Films

A woman in a white sari floats around holding a candle, a haunting tune plays in the background, thunder rumbles, lightening strikes and the scene ends with a deafening scream - well, that’s pretty much a scene right out of a classical Bollywood horror film.
Not anymore.

Bollywood has gone slick; even if the formula is pretty much the same, there is a world of difference in style and presentation. The basic horror elements - the err feel, suspense, shock factor, darkness and the likes - haven’t changed much but we must admit that the Ramsay brand of films with ridiculously painted horror faces is not prevalent any more.

And the audience is lapping up this genre in its new avatar. Take a look at the films lined up for this month: Hum Kaun Hai (a film which is remake of the Nicole Kidman starrer The Others and has Dimple Kapadia, Amitabh Bachchan and Maushumi Chaterjee in the lead roles). Then there is Vaastu Shastra (in which Sushmita Sen shifts to a house which has its set of secrets), Suniel Shetty’s Rakth (based on The Gift, the movie has Bipasha Basu playing the role of a tarot card reader who can see the future), The Village (M. Night Shyamalan’s tale of horror where a village lives in isolation with a secret they hold very close to their hearts).

The trend started in 2002 with Vikram Bhatt’s Raaz, a remake of What Lies Beneath starring Bipasha Basu and Dino Morea. Even the banal Jaani Dushman - Ek Anokhi Kahani found its audience in smaller centers. Ever since, there’s been a deluge: 88 Antop Hill, Darna Mana Hai, Bhoot, Hawa and even Kucch To Hai and Shh..Koi Hai (yes we admit we are broadening the category a bit). However, of these, only Bhoot and Raaz can claim box-office victory. Bhoot’s lead actress Urmila Matondkar performed on a purely instinctive level. There is no reference point for the ghost entering and leaving woman’s body. Ram Gopal Verma who directed Bhoot made Kaun, a suspense-horror-thriller movie, years before Bhoot. He made Bhoot to break typical Indian perspective of Ghost movies. He thinks unlike foreign movies people in India thought ghost movies should have women in white saris, enveloped in mist and lots of screeching. People always associated horror with graveyard. Ram Gopal Verma and the likes have brought horror movies into the dining rooms and neighborhood with Bhoot.

And now, Verma wants to do the ante. This is why his Vaastu Shastra has an added twist of horror. Varma wanted A.R.Rahman to do the score for the movie. When Rahman expressed his inability to do the score Varma roped in another top-notch southern music director Illayaraja to do the same.

The promos of the movie Vaastu Shastra clearly say, ‘If Bhoot scared you, this will kill you’. To add more novelty to the film the producers have decided to flash a legal notice at the beginning of the movie which states that the producers are not responsible for any consequences of watching this film. This is probably promoted as a precaution because one person died last year watching Bhoot.

Vaastu Shastra is set in Saswade, few kms from Pune and has Chakravarthy (of Satya fame) playing a writer who moves with his doctor wife (Sushmita Sen) and four year old son to a house in Saswade in order to complete some writing assignment away from the hustle-bustle of city life. But the mysterious house doesn’t live up to its name - Shanti Kutir. House basement, feline features, candlelit rooms, uneasy eyes, fading lights, blanched ethereal faces, frightening notes crackling sounds and pounding beats, a 10-year old girl in the mandatory white frock will be shown in the movie. The tagline: Vaastu Shastra-’It won’t help you’. Other horror films in the queue are Verma’s Darna Zaroori hai (a sequel to Darna Mana hai) and Amavas starring Konkona Sen Sharma and Tara Sharma. So get ready for a roller coaster ride to chill your bones as both Hollywood and Bollywood unleash a trail of horror.

More on Vaastu Shastra
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Illayaraja to give music for Ramu’s next film Vaastushastra
Vaastu Shastra Movie Review