Horror movie specialist Tariq Al Kazim believes the genre could help the Emirati industry reach new audiences, writes Keith J Fernandez.

Whether it’s a response to a need for escapism, or a way for audiences to explore danger safely, horror films are fast emerging as a notable genre within the fledgling Emirati film industry.

Several recent films have braved cinematic elements in recent years. Tobe Hooper’s ‘Djinn’, produced by Imagenation Abu Dhabi, broke the mould in 2013, and broke records as it explored the region’s fascination with the supernatural. Emirati filmmaker Nayla Al Khaja has recently finished ‘The Shadow’, a teaser for an extended feature reportedly based on actual events. UAE-based Lebanese producer-director Rami Yasin’s vampire family drama is currently working on a vampire family drama, ‘Three Four Eternity’, for Abu Dhabi production house ImageNation.

Director Tariq Al Kazim, meanwhile, has begun pre-production on a sequel to 2017’s ‘A Tale of Shadows’, an English-language film about a gardener who is deeply disturbed by what he sees at the farm where he works. The new movie, ‘A Tale of Shadows: Illusions’, follows the story of a young girl who appears in a hospital, her body mysteriously drenched in blood. A local detective teams up with a journalist to investigate what happened, and the pair land up at an eerie farm, where they find themselves enveloped in a world of illusions, chaos and madness. The film is brought to life by an international cast, including Nigerian actor Chuka Ekweogwu, Romanian actor-writer-producer Robert Cristian Trif, German actress Arzu Neuwirth and Swedish actor Almer Agmyren. Making her film debut is the Emirati artist Samar Al Shamsi, better known for the ‘Arab Mona Lisa’ painting.

The film could hit cinemas early next year, Al Kazim tells us. The filmmaker believes the horror movies offer the promise of reaching audiences beyond his home country without necessarily breaking the bank.

“Horror is an interesting topic for one to pick because regardless of where a person may be from, when a monster in a movie is scary, it engenders fear regardless of where the audience is, and where they come from,” Al Kazim says. Horror traverses cultural contexts, generating an adrenaline rush that keeps audiences coming back for more.

The 26-year-old Emirati has been drawn to the category since he was a child and has created something of a name for himself among regional fans of the genre. Last year, he released another horror film, ‘Until Midnight’, that followed the story of a newly married young man who encounters a stranger with evil intentions.

Horror films need neither big budgets or marquee names to be effective. ‘The Blair Witch Project’, for example, famously made $248 million on a budget of $60,000. While this allows rookie filmmakers plenty of room to experiment, shoestring budgets cut both ways.

“It’s actually really tough to make a horror film, you'd need to be able to do it correctly without any mistakes even in the split second of a frame,” Al Kazim says. “[But] for me, that’s the challenge that I like about it that is one of the reasons why I choose to make horror films.”

Although ‘A Tale of Shadows’ was initially planned as a trilogy, he says the positive response to the first instalment – it premiered in Dubai and played across the UAE – was what brought him back to the story.

“I am very pleased to see the response for the first film. That was one of the main reasons I decided to continue the story,” he says, declining to respond to a question on whether the film has made its money back.

While he believes the UAE film industry needs more incentives to really make an impact internationally, he says Emirati filmmakers can reach broader audiences by tackling universal themes.

“I think we're on the right track [as an industry]; however, more movies need to be developed. Without more movies, there would be less celebrities, less market, less stories and less interest, so it all starts with having a big push that would really build this industry,” he says. “There are several ways to achieve a broader range of audiences, [but] it’s all about the story. It needs to be universally relatable.”