Haunted University

Casts : Panward Hemmanee, Anna Reese, Ashiraya Peerapatkunchaya

Based on various horror and ghost tales set in universities, the film centers around some students who encounter paranormal events in their university. They must fight against their fears and scary things that are haunting their university. Pretty standard Thai horror happenings going on here but there are a few things that sets Haunted Universities apart from the rest. Although the film aims to bring out the best in urban legends, I felt like I had seen this film before many years ago. I felt like it borrowed plenty of elements in old Western films from the same genre. Now, if you follow the horror films on my website you’ll know I am a sucker for films that have smaller stories within them. Anthology films are all the rage these days, especially horror anthologies. Typically, they all wind up being guilty pleasures though.

For the most part, the actresses brang a lot of emotion that the audience could empathise with throughout the movie. In “The Toilet”, a group of bad guys goes to a school to retrieve drugs from a young student’s locker. However, they didn’t expect the terror waiting for them in the school’s haunted fifth-floor bathroom. I loved the suspense the actors gave off in this segment and I felt it was the overall strongest link in the film. Our other tales involve the various corpses and victims our Rescue Crew encounters during a typical Bangkok night shift. You know, typical university killing stuff. Nothing really new here, but I have to say it’s a restrained film compared to Phobia and it’s sequel.

All in all, Haunted Universities falls short in being an all-out Thai horror film. But, I give it unique points for conducting four loosely joined but solidly scary ghost stories that take place in the halls of higher learning. After all, we do have a story here that involves a serial killer who cruises the Bangkok nights in search of vulnerable young women to slaughter. So, this film definetely has it’s cool moments. Just expect lots of typical ‘in-your-face’ ghostly shocks.

The third story, entitled Morgue, is the comedy-horror segment about a student of dentistry with a terrible fear of the dead having to survive one working night in a hospital morgue. Predictability on this one is an understatement. But again, as I found myself so conflicted throughout watching this film and writing this review, despite it’s flaws if you can’t wait for your Thai movie fix, this film will more than do the job.

Of course, every anthology movie has to have a weaker segment, and it is more often than not the supposedly comical one that saps all energy and fun out of the film it appears in. But, if you follow my site, this shouldn’t be your first time around the block, and if you are new to this genre I would recommend you track down Phobia & Phobia II instead.