15 No./ A new kind of haunted house
Three ways new Netflix chiller His House gives a classic horror template a fresh spin
1 IT DOESN’T LOOK LIKE OTHER HORRORS
Remi Weekes, the first-time director of His House, loves horror. “My tastes are pretty broad and ridiculous,” he says, citing both The Shining and Leprechaun as influences. “I don’t shy away from convention,” he freely admits. “[But] I feel like Western cinema is often told from a small perspective. I’ve always enjoyed the idea of being able to go to spaces we know so well and populate them with characters who aren’t regulars in those genres.” Aside from a short appearance from Matt Smith, His House is largely a two-hander, with rising Black British stars Sope Dirisu (Gangs Of London) and Wunmi Mosaku (Luther) playing refugees fleeing war-torn Sudan; casting them, Weekes, says, was “the easiest decision I made in the entire film”.
2 IT’S SET IN A HAUNTED COUNCIL HOUSE
After surviving a treacherous sea crossing, Bol (Dirisu) and Rial (Mosaku) are placed in strikingly grim British refugee housing: crawling vermin, peeling wallpaper, vomit on the doorstep, the front door hanging off its hinges. This ain’t the Amityville mansion. Yet it might even be more homely than the conditions experienced in reality, notes Weekes: “I would say that [refugee housing] is probably grimmer than we portray in the film. Normally, you’d have many more people squeezed into the house. What we have in the film only scratches the surface of what actually goes on in this country.”
3 IT PLUCKS SCARES STRAIGHT FROM THE NEWS
As the couple attempt to make a new life, their house is haunted by a witch in the walls — a ghoul drawn from African mythology. “A lot of stuff in the film is inspired by folklore from the Dinka people,” says Reekes. “The two characters are from the Dinka tribe.” It’s all underpinned by the real-life humanitarian crisis that drove the couple to seek asylum in the first place. There was “a constant conversation”, says Reekes, in finding the balance between the real and the surreal. “It was very important to me that we were always being respectful to real emotions at every stage of the film.” The real-life horror of the refugee experience, of course, is far scarier than any ghost story.
HIS HOUSE IS COMING SOON TO NETFLIX