I enjoy watching horror films. I was brought up watching a lot of them. This however did not remove my fear of scary things, I even have a weird phobia, which I guess was brought by watching a certain horror movie, but I still have this appreciation for this genre. I haven't seen much horror films lately because my closest friends are not really into them. That's why it was so nice to be able to see a good one last Sunday.


One of the factors that I enjoy in watching horror films is the twist and turns of the movie. Good ones always have a conflict or a plot that would need a lot of figuring out or mind games. I was able to see one in the special premiere screening of "Hantu" by Joey Paras. Having the element of supernatural beings or ghosts defy common logic, thus gives a lot possibilities and theories that really makes me think.






Whenever I am presented with something that is potentially scary, I would try to find logic on how or why. However, if there's too much that cannot be explained, I'll be too scared to let my curiosity win, so I'll just run away and scream!

As explained in the movie, "Hantu" is the Indonesian word for ghosts. When I looked it up in Wikipedia, it is attributed to Philippine mythology instead.

"Hantu" is a story of a girl and her dad in a beach resort in Batangas City. I don't want to divulge much information, because I am wishing that this would be released in the main stream and that others would see it too.

The best thing I love about this movie is the story. The plot is so gripping and mind boggling that even if you are so afraid, you would still want to see and know what would happen next. It almost can be vice versa that you would want to know the rest of the story because it's just so scary that you would want a closure so you can sleep tonight.

Since it's a low budget film, my expectations were not that high, however, most were met and some exceeded. One turn off would be the scoring. After the screening they opened the floor for comments and suggestions. Unfortunately, I was not that composed and brave to shoot my hand up and say my piece. If I grabbed the chance, I would have said the praises I mentioned here and challenge them to make a few more editing in terms of the sound. They should try and explore the eerie power of silence. There was too much sound, that is obviously unreal, like the chirping birds, and the musical score itself can most of the time be leading and makes you anticipate that something creepy will happen or appear and will make you a little less scared or disappointed or worse laugh. So, again, maybe, just try and test how much spookier it would be if the scoring and sounds would be subdued than what was presented during the premier. Silence could be horrifying.

Also, whenever I watch horror movies, and sometimes with other genre, I think about what I would be doing if I were in the actor's or actress's shoes. Most of the time for scary movies, after a series of freaky instances, I would already run away and most of the characters would still stay or worse go to the eye of the storm. In this movie however, one of the biggest I-will-never-do-that-if-a-ghost-is-after-me moment was to change my clothes. It will not even cross my mind.

Overall, I really appreciated this movie and I sure hope it would be released to the public and I'll be more than happy to recommend this to other people if they are into this type of movies.

Good job to all those who are part of the success of this movie. And I look forward to future films that are brought by your passion for the arts.

What are the latest scary movies you've seen lately? Let me know in your comments!