Movie Review: The Other Side of the Door (2016) October Horror Fest (18)

When I was choosing my next movie I chose this one because it has some influences on Hinduism stars Sara Callies (Walking Dead - Lori; Prison Break or Colony) and  also Jeremy Sisto  (Wrong Turn and The Returned). Two children Sofia Rosinsky and Logan Crean and Suchitra Pillai a Bollywood actress. 

Review
We've got these family Maria and Michael who decide to live in India and raise their unborn child there. He is an antique dealer and she is going to be a housewife. We jump 7 years (I think) into the future where Maria is suffering because the dead of her son Oliver and she can't cope with it. She tries to kill herself with pills but Michael saves her in time. When in hospital, their housekeeper Piki tells her that there is a way to communicate with the dead. To make some closure on the subject - since Oliver died tragically and she blames herself. She tells Maria that there is a temple where she must put his ashes and lock herself inside that very temple. She will be able to communicate with the dead through the door but she must not open the door, no matter what.

When she is talking with the boy, she opens the door... What did you expect? - This is a horror movie...

Some Aghori appear and says something uncompreensible things to her (I will explain later what are the Aghori).

She returns home, with a feel of closure, after all she doesn't understand what she did but at least she was able to talk to her son and ask for sorry - which he forgives.

After returning, things start to change, first Lucy starts playing with the ghost of the brother and even Maria was happy because she was reading to him again as he manifest himself. Michael is oblivous to all.

But soon afterwards things start to go wrong. First all plants died and the birds they had. Then Lucy start to show fear towards his spirit and even Maria trembled. Piki confronts Maria telling that as she opened the door she let the dead come in and since Buddhists believe in reincarnation and Myrtu couldn't claim his soul... basically her son is being corrupted until Myrtu (The GateKeeper) can claim him/it. Btw, I couldn't find anything on the name of Myrtu (Why?) She also says that she must burn everything related to him. I must say, at this point I thought the movie was going one place and then he went another...

AS the family leaves the house, Piki gathers all Oliver things and tries to burn it but she starts to hear her own daughter (who had died on a pound) and she is drown in the pound. Meanwhile Maria continues Piki work to burn all Michael things and does not believe Maria's ramblings about Oliver and when Maria asks for help from Lucy she says that she knows nothing about it as well. When they are putting Lucy to bed Maria realizes that Oliver possessed Lucy and feeling that Maria is unbalanced locks her in. As they are leaving the house they see that their house is surrounded by Aghori. As Michael is talking to the police Lucy(Oliver) kills their dog and stabs Michael. Maria leaves the room and tries to find Lucy(Oliver) and she finds her in Oliver's room pin to the ground with half a dozen Aghori. She stops the ritual and asks Oliver to possess her and leave Lucy and so be it. One Aghori stabs a now possessed Maria and as she is closing his eyes she sees the Gatekeeper claiming her.

When she opens her eyes she hears Michael calling her. She realizes that she is the temple - this time on the outside and Michael saying that he can't live without her and he must see her. She realizes that he is openinig the door and screams that he musn't do it... The movie ends...

Synopsis
Hinduism is not a easy religion to understand as Christianity or Islam - is more akin to our pagan beliefs. Hinduism is more than a religion; it's a culture,  philosophy and a way of living. And to a foreigner, no matter what we read we never fully understand all the concepts and such. In Abrahamic religions - there is wrong and bad, white and black, good and evil - and that's it. In Hinduism and some pagan (Celtic per example) there is much more than that. I am not going to rambling about Hinduism and such but I am going to say that his movie focus a bit on it and it tries to pick a bit of mysticism and mix with  horror. 

In other horror movies, the grand majority there is no explanation on the why's and here they explain why the ghost appear, why the ghost turn evil and why they must do what they must do. To me, that's a very interesting way of putting it. I really enjoy this movie and the ending was truly good. It leave us with a wondering of what is happening and to me left me to wonder if there are more good indian horror movies. 

Advisable to anyone who wants a good horror story based on a fear/regret and to all of us... Would you let it go? Or would you open the door? In



Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christiany and Islam) we mourn for our dead and many feel sorrow, regrets and sometimes don't let them go... In other (more Asian beliefs) they mourn (I think) but also they let them go, because they believe in afterlife, reincarnation or other form of transition. And to me that makes more sense...