Siddharth reveals the history behind his horror movie ‘The House Next Door’

Actor Siddharth (of ‘Rang De Basanti’ fame) is geared up for his upcoming horror flick ‘The House Next Door’. In a recent media interaction, the actor spoke about what intrigued him towards the movie and how it all unfolded.

Said Siddharth, “So what happened was that Milind and I have been best friends for 17 years. So both of us have been big fans of horror films. We used to watch almost every horror film in theatre and we used to discuss that we should make a good horror film. So around five years ago, Milind said, ‘Okay, I’m ready,  let’s do this, let’s start writing. So we started building on what we should and shouldn’t do. The classic don’ts were we didn’t want to make what is being made already so there is no dilution. There shouldn’t be any comedy, unnecessary songs, or item songs etc. The do’s included that we will make an original unique visual horror experience. That we will make a really scary film because we both love horror and I believe that people love to get scared and hence we wanted to make a pure horror film. So that’s how we started. Milind came and he gave me 3-4 templates. Then, we narrowed down on one and started writing. Then , we started doing a lot of research. As a part of our research, we met people in Himachal Pradesh, got some incidents which really inspired us. So our film is based on a true story which happened with real people whom I know. It took us almost 4.5 years to write the script because this genre has been never been done before.”

He further added, “That’s because when a ‘Conjuring’ or ‘Annabelle’ releases, everyone goes to see but when we make a horror movie, we tend to mix other elements into it. Talking about our movie when we saw the film with sound and visuals, we went back to that dos and don’ts list. We made exactly the film that we wanted to make and we didn’t do any of the things we did not want to do. Also, we have tried to keep it very realistic. Usually,  horror films are not supposed to be realistic here. But, if you see the South Korean or the Japanese horror films they are very very realistic. So, the reality of our film is not being compromised anywhere and we maintain the same mood for the performances. We’ve genuinely tried to scare people.” (Also Read: Friday, the 13th! Record of spooky things that happened on ‘The House Next Door’ sets)

When asked about comparison with other horror movies, he said,  “I think people will compare our movie with only Hollywood films because the standard of the film is there.  Because I’m not amongst those people who copy a concept. It’s a story which we’ve created from scratch. ”

Further, on being told as to how horror movies in India don’t really have a good track record, and whether it bothers him, Siddharth replied, “I think bad horror movies don’t have a track record. Good horror movies have a great track record. We’ve made a great horror film. I don’t say this for all my films but this is a game changer.”

‘The House Next Door’ is written and directed by Milind Rau which stars Siddharth and Andrea Jeremiah in lead roles. It is slated for release on November 3, 2017.

Prajakta Ajgaonkar

Passionate about writing, and a Bollywood lover, she is all that is sweet and endearing! She desires to put her best foot forward in everything that she does and loves to help anyone who’s in need.