Film: "Horror Story"; Cast: Karan Kundra, Ravish Desai, Hasan Zaidi, Nishant Malkani, Nandini Vaid, Aparna Bajpai, and Radhika Menon; Director: Ayush Raina; Rating:***
And then there were numb. Horror of horrors! Imagine a Hindi horror film, which takes no song breaks, no respite for comedy or romance ... no room for anything except the terror.
"Horror Story" is one of the bluntest most direct tales of terror to be unleashed in recent times. The feeling of being trapped with a group of youngsters, who would want to be anywhere except the place that the spooky script selects for them, stays with us till the end.
Uppermost in the script is a sense of impending catastrophe. Producer-writer Vikram Bhatt has always been attracted to terror and the occult. But when an A-lister actress runs around in skimpy clothes trying to look terrified, one does get distracted.
It is a monster-stroke to cast completely new faces in "Horror Story". The young cast is competent and capable of carrying the chills forward to its fatal finale.
Debutant director Ayush Raina shoots the grisly goings-on with the minimum stress on conventional sounds and visuals associated with the horror genre. Belatedly the horror genre has chanced upon the relevance of austerity in putting forward the panic and terror of youngsters trapped in a situation where they cannot escape from a satanic annihilation.
Familiar fear is here transmitted into a slickly spun yarn that keeps you glued to the gore.
The narrative is clustered together into a collage of scenes evoking a sense of growing foreboding.
Gargey Trivedi's cinematography at once creates a sense of urgency and doom.
The characters are captured in postures of desperate resignation to a situation over which they have no control. Luckily for these unlucky youngsters, the director is in full control of their destiny.
Amar Mohile's background score comes and goes insistently reminding us of the monster that manoeuvres mortality into the fast lane.
A scare-fest that makes your blood freeze and flesh crawl, "Horror Story" is your worst nightmare come true. Shot in colours that contour the flavour of dread and doom, the feel-fear flick has moment that make your heart skip a beat.
For those who like their terror served piping-hot, this one is on top of the menu.
