BILL BIRTLES, REPORTER: Late at night in the jungle, a Javanese ghost story comes to life. Characters become possessed as the plot takes a chilling twist.
BILL BIRTLES: According to one film analyst there were 108 local films screened in cinemas last year of which 51 were horror stories and that’s prompted some film critics to ponder if other genres of Indonesian film are being neglected by the studios. DERBY ROMERO: Indonesian audience, they’re craving for good ones now, so I think even if you do a horror movie, but you don’t really make it good, then people wouldn’t watch it.
And the obsession with ghost stories in southeast Asia’s largest country extends beyond the silver screen. BILL BIRTLES: The company running this has another two travelling haunted house teams in Indonesia. They run their pop ups for a few months at a time before moving on to the next city.SLAMAT HARIYANTO : The business started because of the horror movies boom - we tried it out and turned out many people are interested.BILL BIRTLES: It is so popular in Indonesia the leading box office film of this year, a comedy called Agak Laen is about a crew running a haunted house.