What's wrong with Paranormal Genre in India ?

July 07th marks the death anniversary of the legendary Gaurav Tiwari, the prolific “Paranormal Investigator”. Hailing from Patna, he was the ‘Founder cum CEO’ of the “Indian Paranormal Society” the first of its kind in India. On discovering about his contributions in the field of paranormal research, I was compelled to ponder over the fact that “Why Paranormal as a genre is lagging in terms of the content that is being produced in India ?”

PROBLEMS WITH PARANORMAL AS A GENRE IN INDIA :-

The Indian Paranormal Movies need a serious upliftment, more like a revolution that romantic genre got in 1990s & 2000s.

Well that's means nothing if basic issues aren't addressed to their roots, these are :-

1. Lack of research behind the scenes :-

Majority of bollywood directors have been reluctant to brainstorm behind the technicalities that goes into the movie other than romantic genre, which has led Paranormal genre being an untapped potential genre and saturating the other one.

With almost all the horror movies having love stories and similar vengeanceful spirits taking revenge, the stories have become a lot  predictable. An exception to this is “1920”, where love story was demand of the plot.

Examples :- Creature 3D, Alone 3D, 1920 – Evil Returns, 1920 – London, 1921, etc.

2. No connection with the real world :-

Let alone fiction, the real life incidents are improvised to such an extent that their originality is lost somewhere. I understand the privacy aspect but change in sequencing of events makes it synthetic and uncanny for ‘Based on Real Life Incident’ tagline.

Example : Dissociative identity disorder when explored in “Bhool Bhulaiyaa (2007)” might feel like a progressive film, where superstitions are dispelled in favour of science & reason. However, looking at the film from a 2021 perspective, the treatment is highly questionable and became the very thing the plot revolves around to bust out – ‘Unscientific Approach’.

3. Unnecessary eroticism :-

Yet another problematic tactics of bollywood directors to draw masses. Unnecessarily, the cast is sexualized & eroticized even without the demand of the script. The movie trailers are full of such softcore porn scenes and ‘none to little exciting elements’ are potrayed as binding factor.

Example : Ragini MMS series, Alone, Shaapit and the list goes on.

4. Continuity error among the sequels :-

 Bollywood Paranormal directors lack far sightedness, a vision to establish a “Paranormal Universe” to keep the audience engaged. The discontinuity among the sequels, ie, no relation among the sequels, causes people to percieve them as ‘individual 3 hour timepass’ and more precisely; as “one time watch”.

Example : The 1920 franchise and it's installments have no connection among themselves and thus is unjust to the very term sequel.

 

5. Weak storyline :-

This is a grave concern as almost every second bollywood horror movie rely merely on jump scares, VFX, etc rather than investing on the story plot, character arches, etc. This leads to a dissatisfied consumer experience which ensures that the same person would either neglect the director’s involvement in future similar movies, or cancel the entire genre as a whole. A weak storyline should either be rejected in pre script phase or must be replaced by a better one.

Example : Phoonk, Ghost, Creature 3D, etc

6. Public appreciation :-

Good horror movies are seldom appreciated by the masses. After the movies being restricted for minors by ‘Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC)’, the reach is by default restricted to 18+ strata and on top of it, people prefer fancy movies over the good ones that have been overcommercialized for revenues.

A good movie outplayed by an illogical movie without a sensible story and starring popular faces, puts the entire art into jeopardy.

Example - Tumbbad (2018) is a folk horror cum fantasy movie released by Eros International. Despite of being in existential crisis not once, not twice but thrice prior it's release, the entire movie was made in ₹5 crores. It ended up yielding ₹13.57 crores overall but was highly appreciated by the critics. Public was reluctant to give it try until and unless independent Youtubers like ‘Divyanshu Logi’ recommended for the same and it got featured on ‘Netflix’.

7. Cliche Orthodox Music Formula :-

A proper music track of lyricists jotting down the lyrics, playback singers giving their voices, mixing & mastering, cast romancing to it, etc, won't work with just any movie released in bollywood.

An eerie tuning for buildup (followed by the jump scare) is understandable but actors & actresses dancing to music isn't.

Example(s) :- Creature 3D, Raaz Franchise, etc. ‘Raaz – The Mystery Continues’ turned out to be a ‘memorable music album’ rather than scaring the audience in theatres for time to come.

8. Lack of creativity :-

There also exist certain movies which either have been adapted from the west (eg : 1920) or are remakes of their South Indian counterparts (eg : Bhool Bhulaiyaa). As a diligent consumer of paranormal content, I've to first cross check the adaptation or the original version of any horror movie I stumble upon nowadays in bollywood.

Rather short movies by budding producers and directors should be given opportunity to lay out their magic on screens.

Examples : Chai biscuit, Tyakt, 2 A.M., etc.

HOW THE WEST HAS SET THE BENCHMARK SO HIGH ?

The sole standing tall universe representing paranormal genre is the “Conjuring Universe” which has shattered box office more than once. Even though there are some below average horror movies in Hollywood, still the numbers are even out by the good ones annually.

• Interwoven in a chronology :-

The Conjuring Universe is the epitome of an Interwoven link of related events which directly or indirectly impact each other. From the early events of “Dark Ages in The Nun”, to “The Conjuring : The Devil made me do it”, the viewers are always entertained via one storyline or the other.

The diversification that an entire universe brings is comparatively better than one at a time story pattern followed in India.

• Complete character arches :- 

Multiple appearances in the storyline means ample time to potray a particular character so as to explore & depict it's all personalities or traits. This not only helps in audience to retain the character itself for time to come but leaves the filmmakers with variety of options to alter the storyline whenever they want.

• Relation with the real world :-

The Conjuring Universe again proves its mettle in this aspect of securing real life references which gives the audience a ‘relatability factor’ to connect with.

As the entire Conjuring Universe revolves around the real life cases of the legendary couple – ‘The Warrens’, their personal life experiences are a treat to watch on screen.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS :-

There exist some quality content as well that were out of world and entertained to their best, these are :-

• Tumbbad (2018) - A mythological story about a goddess who created the entire universe. The plot revolves around the consequences when humans build a temple for her first-born.

•  13B: Fear Has a New Address (2009) - A man experiences a supernatural occurrence at his newly purchased apartment; a soap opera being telecast exclusively on his TV, which shows the future of his family.

• Kaal (2005) - A tiger expert, his wife, two tourists and a village chief engage in a battle for survival against supernatural beasts within Jim Corbett National Wildlife Park unknowingly trusting the expert, who later turns out to be a wrecked soul determined to take them down one by one.

• Ek Kahani Aisi Bhi (2014) - It was a radio podcast show aired on 93.5 red FM in 2014, in which RJ Praveen used to narrate paranormal stories of urban & rural India.

I'd highly recommend you to listen to it on YouTube & Streaming Platforms (Spotify, etc)

• YouTube Short Films - Nowadays many independent & budding students, freelancers, etc have stepped up to uplift the paranormal genre with their uniquely created concepts, attractive cinematography and acting skills. Despite of financial constraints, these short films are not only ruling the YouTube algorithms, but also winning awards as well.

SOME OTHER PARANORMAL INVESTIGATORS :-

1. John Zaffis :- Born on December 12, 1955 in Connecticut (USA), initially he wasn't inclined towards these spiritual entities, but at the age of 16, he saw a transparent apparition near his bed, who was bobbing his head. On discussing with his mom, he came to know that his maternal grandfather used to Bob his head similarly, when he used to be furious. Days after this incident, John's grandmother expired and this led to his fascination towards the same.

He later went onto study a detailed analysis of “Paranormal Stuffs”. The famous Warrens were his relatives and he did his initial studies with them only. John appeared in multiple TV reality shows (eg : SYFY & Haunted Collector, etc). In 1988, he formed the “Paranormal & Dermatology Research Society of New England” which is functional till date.

2. Montague Summers - Born on April 10, 1880 in England, he used to consider himself as a “Witch Hunter”. In 1928, he translated the witch hunter manual – “Malleus Malific Arum” from 15th Century into English language and even was a believer of vampires. He was an Oxford graduate and initially wanted to be a priest, but was barred from further studies due to his interest in occult. It is also believed that he used to roam on steeets in England in 1920s for witch hunting.

3. Harry Price - Born on January 17, 1881, he was a British ‘Parasychologist’ & ‘Parapsychic Researcher’. He came into limelight while exposing then spiritualists and medium commuters, which was really a big deal in early 1900s as science & reasoning was a blue moon then. In 1920, he joined the “Society of Psychical Research” and exposed ‘William Hope’ & ‘Jan Guzik’ via his learnings. The biggest expose of his career was of a British spiritual medium – ‘Fredrick Tansley Munnings’ who claimed to produce the independent spirit voices of ‘Julius Caesar’, ‘Dan Leno’, ‘Hawley Harvey Crippen’ and ‘King Henry VIII’.

4. The Warrens :- The Paranormal Investigating couple – “Edward & Lorraine Warren” (December 5, 1926 to August 23, 2006 & January 31, 1927 to April 18, 2019). Their contributions in the field of paranormal research is immeasurable and they almost worked their entire life for the same. One of the most known and controversial cases of their careers are “The Amityville Murder Case” & “Trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson aka The devil made me do it case”. The entire Conjuring Universe revolves around their cases and the nun representation of the demon Valak was adapted from Lorraine Warren's personal life experience where she recalls to be haunted by a demon having a dark hooded like figure.

A WAY FORWARD :-

As long as the production houses & the people involved in it are going to play safe and keep saturating the romantic genre, people will eventually look out for new and untapped potential genres like paranormal ones. The motto shouldn't be to endorse superstitions & voodoo, but to make people aware of presence of an invisible energy.

I'm not asking anyone to develop a faith in it, I'll let it to your own personal experience. Till then, as a receiver of such content, you as audience can do a favor by appreciating worthy and sincere ones by watching their content, sharing it to maximum level (as much as you can), rate their content on Reddit, Quora, etc.

“LAST BUT NOT THE LEAST, IF SOMETHING IS INVISIBLE TO YOU, THAT DOESN'T MEAN IT DOESN'T EXIST !”