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Four of
Thailand's most popular horror directors have
come together to make four individual horror stories;
Loneliness, Deadly Charm, The Last Fright and The
Middle Man. Read on to find out what they're about.
Just yesterday I watched this mediocre and forgettable
but overall mildly entertaining horror anthology called
"Trapped Ashes". Now here I am with the biggest Thai
horror box-office success of the year (so far) and
guess what? It's just as mediocre and forgettable, only
with better production values. I was kind of excited
about this one actually since the two directors behind
Alone and Shutter had directed two of the movies but
let me tell you, these guys should stick to being a
team as they are clearly not ready to go solo.
Phobia, which by the way is not a general theme that
runs through all of the stories - I don't know why
they called it this, starts out with the horror flick
"Loneliness" which is directed by the producer of Alone
and Body. Now don't get me wrong but I honestly believe
that just about anyone can produce a movie, you don't
need a lot of talent or creativity in you to do that
so just because Youngyut produced two successful horror
flicks, it doesn't necessarily mean that a good
director and this short story proves that. Loneliness
tells the story of a lonely teenage girl who's desperate
for a job as well as companionship. When she receives an
anonymous text message from someone who claims to want
to be her friend, she doesn't even care that it seems
a bit odd that the person won't reveal his identity.
Naturally the text messages get progressively stranger
and creepier until terror finally strikes. So it's
another cell-phone oriented horror flick, right? Wrong!
Loneliness doesn't have a single word of dialogue in
it. Not a single one. It's like the modern day equivalent
of a silent movie - and it's not a very good one. There's
no tension, no suspense, no atmosphere and the scares
are so predictable that I couldn't help but to laugh
when the movie eventually tried to be somewhat creepy.
Sure enough, it's nicely shot and all but this was just
fodder material if you ask me. By the time that this
movie had finished I figured that they had probably
slapped the worst one on first but I was wrong.
Next up is Deadly Charm from the director of Body (which
is not saying much since that was only a mediocre
horror flick). Just like Body, Deadly Charm is riddled
with CGI effects - only they're not quite as good this
time around. It's about a group of bullies who get
what they deserve when a kid that they've bullied
decides to get back at them with the help of black
magic. This one is just all over the place. While there
wasn't enough going on in the first story, there's
way too much going on in here. It was as if they had
tried to fit a 90-minute horror flick into 20 minutes
of running time. It didn't work very well. Furthermore,
the story isn't very interesting, the characters are
beyond unlikeable and this one clearly turned out to be
the worst one out of the bunch.
In "The Middle Man", director Banjong Pisanthanakun
makes his first solo debut after the success of Shutter
and Alone and while it proves to be much more effective
than the previous two movies, it's certainly not that
great. It tells the story of four teenage boys who are
out camping and rafting in the woods. When one of the
boys disappear while rafting, the other boys assume
that he's dead and decide to turn in for the night.
Sure enough, they get an unwelcomed visit later that
night. The Middle Man is a crowd pleaser, I'll give it
that. It's funny, the bond between the friends feels
real and these really are four genuine characters. As
a comedy it works quite well but as a horror flick it
falls quite flat. It's never very scary and everytime
the tension is building up, it's ruined by a joke.
It's an okay story, don't get me wrong, it just didn't
deliver what it was supposed to if you ask me.
Finally we have Parkpoom Wongpoom's solo debut, the
one that's been most talked about out of all of these
films - The Last Fright. What surprised me about this
one was that it was almost entirely in English language.
It's about a stewardess who gets assigned to serve a
princess during a flight. She soon finds out that the
man that the princess is married to however, is her
secret lover. Shortly thereafter, the princess dies
and the stewardess has to fly back with the corpse of
the dead woman. Yep, terror lies ahead. This is the best
story out of the bunch and as a stand-alone horror
flick I think it could have been decent but unfortunately
it's not strong enough to carry this entire anthology
on its own. It could have been a lot creepier but it
just never gets to the point where you're as scared as
you were the first time you watched Shutter or Alone.
In the end, Phobia is just barely mediocre. I'm not even
sure that it deserves a rating of 3/5. It really seems
as if the directors didn't think that this was going to
be a big hit and just dropped the ball with the entire
concept. I guess their egos got the best of them. Either
way, if you're a fan of ghost stories, Phobia is an okay
rent but if you're expecting another horror flick like
Alone or Shutter, you will be disappointed - I know I was.
An impalement, eyes gouged out and some more. Not much.
The piano music was generic and the rock music just
didn't do it for me at all.
Far from as great as it could have been. These four
short stories just don't feel very inspired if you ask
me. It didn't seem like anyone really cared about this
project and I find it surprising that it's went on to
be such a smash hit at the local box-office. An okay
movie to kill some time with but not very memorable.
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