It all began with a dream. Mumbai-based British filmmaker Patrick Graham was so invested in reading about torture in the modern world that it turned into a nightmare about a detention centre. In it, enters an inmate, who manages to terrify the guards as well as fellow prisoners. As soon as Graham woke up, he scribbled down his dream and developed it into a script. “This story makes me sound like a pretentious lying idiot,” laughs Graham, who insists on the nightmare being the genesis of Ghoul , Netflix’s first Indian horror series.
Close on the heels of Sacred Games ’ success, we find ourselves once again on a conveyor belt of Netflix interviews at a posh suburban hotel in Mumbai. This time it is to discuss their second Indian original series with the makers and cast of Ghoul . Set in a dystopian future, the three-episode miniseries follows a new intelligence recruit, Nida (Radhika Apte), at an isolated interrogation centre, who believes a dreaded prisoner, Ali Saeed (Mahesh Balraj), is more than human. Graham had to figure out quite early on what form the sinister presence in the show would take. “I was reading up on Arabic folklore and came across the ghoul, which just fit perfectly because of its characteristics,” says the filmmaker, who refuses to elaborate on those traits, fearing that he would reveal too much.
A self-proclaimed horror fanatic, Graham approached Phantom Films with Ghoul ’s script after learning about their pact with Ivanhoe Pictures and Jason Blum’s Blumhouse Productions to co-produce a slate of Indian horror films. “This is the first in [that] collaboration,” says Vikramaditya Motwane, producer and co-founder of Phantom. What was initially supposed to be a film evolved into a mini-series after Netflix came onboard. “So that gave us space to get into more details,” informs Motwane. “But it’s not that we’re only going to do series from now.”
Social monsters
Like Blumhouse’s previous critically-acclaimed film, Get Out (2017), which showcases racism in the States as the looming monster, Ghoul creates a world where intellectuals, academics and minorities — notably Muslims — are detained and tortured by a patriotic establishment for promoting ‘anti-national’ ideologies. It’s inevitable to draw real-life parallels to the racial profiling we see in the series but both Graham and Motwane insist on viewing the show as “pure horror entertainment”. “Islamophobia is an issue in the story but not the focus of it necessarily,” says Graham, adding that the ‘reality’ depicted in the series isn’t only Indian but a global phenomenon. “I’m not pointing fingers at anything in particular,” he adds. “I’m saying I don’t like this particular form of government, I don’t like torture, I don’t like nationalism… It’s a general theoretical approach.”
Similarly, for Apte, Ghoul is a commentary on any doctrine. “It’s about when you’re so deeply involved in any ideology, you forget to question it,” she says, quickly adding that the show isn’t committing to a cause but uses ideological battles only as a set-up. “Essentially, it’s Patrick’s love for blood and gore,” she smirks.
Categorising it as “alternate reality” and “sci-fi fantasy”, Graham emphasises that the appeal of Ghoul lies in its ability to haunt the audience long after their done watching. The focus, therefore, has been on developing the story and an atmosphere of terror rather than actual moments of horror. Is that why he has gone easy on jump scares in the series? “I’m going to get this for the rest of my life,” laughs Graham, as Motwane chuckles along. “I’ve been a horror fan since I was seven but I’ve never counted a horror film’s effectiveness on the number of jump scares,” he says, supporting his argument by citing classics likeJaws (1975) and The Shining (1980). But the filmmaker is aware that modern horror cinema is heavily dependent on the technique. “If I were to do another horror it will be full of jump scares,” he sniggers.
Playing dark room
Trapped in an undercover prison, the darkness and claustrophobia captured in Ghoul wasn’t a far cry from the environment on set, tucked away in the basement of Juhu’s Tulip Star Hotel. Manav Kaul, who plays Colonel Sunil DaCunha, vividly remembers the damp, leaky and smelly location, where the cast was confined for long hours as it rained outside. “We had no network so we were cut off from the world,” he recalls. Kaul is no fan of horror films and admittedly scares easy, so it didn’t take much for him to bring on his fearful expressions on the gloomy sets. Apte nods in agreement as she recounts the arduous task of smearing ash on her face at the crack of dawn for her role.
Confining all characters (and actors) in a single space and letting them grapple with the horror within has been a dominant feature of American filmmaker John Carpenter’s cinema, which Graham deeply admires. “I love the idea of sealing yourself in one scenario,” he shares. “Like a chamber piece.” While this stifling space empowers supernatural elements, it also unleashes the monsters within.
