Lured by folklore
> A six-episode hour-long anthology series based on superstitions and myths brings together six directors from across Asia
but they were about dysfunctional families and social issues. I have even acted as a man who pimps out his mother.
“I plan to use humour to convey the horror in my story.”
Joko, who is a big fan of American horror films and who recently remade the hit 1980 Indonesian horror film Pengabdi Setan, said: “The combination of talents in this project is very interesting. Each one of us has a distinctive style of telling stories.
“The idea behind Folklore is to tell stories rooted in our culture. We don’t rely on gore, sadistic, or sensational scenes. We rely on mythology that is strong in our own country.”
This can be seen in Ho’s story which revolves around a toyol, Joko’s is about a child-kidnapping ghost, while Khoo’s pontianak piece, he said, is unique because it involves a teenager.
“We all love ghost stories,” Khoo added. “Growing up on shows from Cathay Kris like Penanggal and Pontianak, I thought it would be nice to do a ghost story in a present-day scenario.”
Folklore is Ho’s first attempt at horror, and he hopes it gives fans chills like his all-time favourite horror film Rosemary’s Baby: “It is subtle; there is an evil there but you never really see it. It plays on a psychological level.”
As for more recent horror films, he picked Joko’s Pengabdi Setan as a top favourite.
“I like this idea of horror in a [single] location. The haunted house, you can go with that for the next hundred years.
“I feel a good horror film is where you can feel it. In my episode, it is the humans who are the real horror.”
Khoo also said he requested HBO to allow them to use the local language the story is set in, to make it more authentic and believable.
“I mean if you see a Japanese horror film and [the actors are talking] in English, it will look odd. If they dub it, it is terrible.
“If you look at Thai horror films, it is important the way the characters speak and emote.”
Khoo, who is a fan of the directors involved in this project, believes Folklore will be a great slate to combine the talents of these writer-directors.
“They all have their own voices and I think that is what is going to separate [this anthology] from other series,” he said.
“Their [stories are] standalones and will be very different in terms of execution and style. I think that makes it more exciting.”