Rating: * *1/2
Looks like some unseen force read my previous article about horror movie lacking the scare quotient, and directed me to this movie. However, the movie ran out of steam after the first horrifying 15 odd minutes; more on that soon. See Prang is a Thai horror anthology of four shorts. Each one of it is directed by a different director, and they share no common thread to bind them together, except the fact that all of them try to scare the living daylights out of you, and only one of them succeeds; at least for me.
Following are the summary of each shorts in the anthology:
Loneliness: First off, I loved this short, simply because it managed to scare me, and the twist caught me off guard. The story’s about a girl who stays home all alone because of a cast on her leg, which she managed to break in an accident. Her only contact to the outside world is through net surfing, and the occasional exchange of flirty messages with her boyfriend who’s out of station. One day, out of the blue, she gets an anonymous message from some guy, extending a hand of friendship. Foreseeing the temptation of getting to know a guy, as well as to kill time, she decides to reciprocate and replies to all his messages and obliges to some of his harmless requests. A handful of messages down the line, the horror creeps in, and the shocking nature of all the above seemingly benign developments are revealed. As my second nature, as soon as a movie starts, I start looking for clues and hidden messages to unravel the “twist” before it hits you in the face. And, 8 out of 10 times, I’m bang on target. However, this movie managed to outwit me, and the twist grabbed me by my throat. I couldn’t see it coming, and the brilliance involved is that the twist seemed pretty simple, but damn effective. My only grouse with the movie is that it didn’t end soon enough. For a scary movie, the point where and how it ends is extremely important. This short had the “how” going for it, but when it came to “when”, it faltered. It ended a couple of minutes too late. Otherwise, this was the only short from this movie that I truly loved, and would recommend to any true horror fan. As for rest of the shorts, read on, but don’t expect any praises from my sides.
The Deadly Charm: In summary, this short involved black magic; HOW BORING!! A couple of hormonally-charged teenagers pick on a defenseless kid, because he had squealed on them, which led to their suspension and seizure of drugs they always carried along. They bully him mercilessly, until it goes too far (like it always does), and the victim returns as a ghost with vengeance, utilizing his prowess in black magic to bump off each one of his nemesis, in pretty gory and unique way. Now, it’s time for nitpicking. The director somehow convinced himself to shoot whole movie like some hyper-kinetic action sequence from one of the Matrix Trilogy movies. I mean, seriously, the last thing a horror flick needs is the abuse of all the technical know-how. All those flamboyant edits, the camera angles, the tint the frames were dipped in, and the horribly terrible background score. Not to mention, the pathetic use and overuse of CG. It doesn’t help the cause if you have terrible actors to deliver on an already terrible plot. It tried to do everything, except scare you. This short was the worst of the lot. That’s it. I’m not wasting my breath on this one anymore; PERIOD.
The Man In The Middle: Four friends are out in the woods, camping, telling each other horror stories at night, just to scare the other to his wits. In the process, the director saw it appropriate to reveal the ending of some awesome horror movies; like “The Sixth Sense”, “The Others”, and the one I haven’t seen “Shutter (Original)”. Jesus Christ!! Anyway, back to the mind-numbing summary. All four of them go rafting, which due to someone’s stupidity, goes wrong. However, they mange to come out of the water unharmed, or did they? Did you see the sheer inanity and silliness of the director to reveal all his cards? From this point on, you’ll guess who’s who, and believe me; you’ll turn out to be right. Even a 10 year old would guess the so called “WOW” factor of this short. I guessed half the twist, but the part I didn’t guess was only the multiple of what I had already figured out. The sentence might seem convoluted, but if and when you see the movie, you’ll know what I’m talking about. But I got to admit, the movie wasn’t as bad as the previous short. Agreed, that there was absolutely no horror value, but some light moments peppered throughout the short were pretty amusing. A couple of actors were decent at best.
The Last Flight: Firstly, this was the second crappiest short in the movie. It’s about an air hostess who has an affair with some prince, who already has a princess (frankly, she looks horrible. No wonder he strayed). The hostess was serving this couple, when the prince’s libido crossed the fidelity line. Thereafter, the affair leads to the fallout of their marriage, and the princess wants the hostess to pay. The princess decides to return to her homeland, albeit with a condition: the flight she’ll be taking must have the same hostess to serve her, so she could taunt her and exact her revenge. After taking some minor insults and hot coffee spills from the princess, the hostess somehow, ends up killing the princess; BAD KARMA. The cliché-ridden rollercoaster doesn’t stop here. After the princess’ death, her body needs to be flown back to her country, and guess who’ll be the stewardess on the flight? Damn right. An opportune situation to use all the textbook horror antics, accompanied by the usual cacophonic orchestra, is what plays out in the next few scenes. There’s nothing you haven’t seen before, and you’ll experience annoyance, disappointment, ear-bleed (maybe). But you won’t experience horror, because there isn’t any. You can anticipate with almost certainty, as to what the director will be filling the next frame with. Yes, that’s right, a terribly-decked up lady ghost, with bloodshot eyes, and puke-filled mouth gaping right in your face. The only thing this movie made me feel, was being pissed off at the insurmountable silliness and the hackneyed approach adopted by the makers. The lady playing the hostess was competent, but the short wasn’t.
Overall, if you were to come across this movie, and decide to watch it, please stop watching it right after the first short. The first short had a very simple story told in an unimaginably horrifying way, with a cute girl to play the lead. As for the rest of the movie, don’t even bother fast forwarding through them; even that’ll be a waste of time.
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