Neighbors They are Vampires is the Bollywood horror Movie that released in 2011. For all practical purposes this is the last Ramsay horror movie that enjoyed a mainstream release. The movie stars some familiar names, like Shakti Kapoor and Anupam Kher’s brother, Raju Kher.  There’s a lot to know about this movie, so hang around with me while I unpack all of it.

Neighbors – Synopsis

Sanam is a young girl who lives with her uncle and aunt. She loves horror movies and everyone teases her about it. She’s also the fan of the horror writer, Inderjeet Khanna. Sapna has a boyfriend, Karan, who tolerates her love for the evil.  The two also have a friend, Aryan. Soon, new tenants move into the bungalow next to her’s, and Sapna think that the bungalow is haunted.

One day, Sanam meeets the writer and tells him that she’s a big fan of his and wants to read his book, Hot Blood. He invites them over to his house and they agree that they will come over soon.

In the bungalow, a mage is trying to bring back Kapalika, a witch that used to haunt an old village in the outskirts of Mumbai. She was once defeated by a forest officer Vikrant,but the evil sage wants to bring her back.

One day, a young man comes asking for the address, and Sapna and her boyfriend point him to the bungalow. The man sees a strange, mysterious cult members in the bungalow and tries to run away but is killed.

The next day, the news channels report about the young man being killed and his heart being taken away. Sanam sees the news report and is flabbergasted, she thinks that they should tell the police about the address for the Bungalow 13.

Watch Wohi Bhayanaak Raat

In reality, the sage takes the warm blood of young men to satiate Kapalika and keep her alive.  Sapna and her friends meet the author, who not just gives them the book but also tells them about vampires.

Aryan makes fun of the professor’s story and the professor flies into a rage. He admonishes them and tells them not to set foot in his house again.

Kapalika brings a young man, Rohit to the house and kills him. Sanam sees this and is now sure that her neighbors are vampires.  She and her friends rush to the author’s house and tell him that her neighbor is a vampire.

Inderjeet calls up Kapalika and says that her neighbor suspects that she is a vampire. Kapalika laughs it off and calls them home. Inderjeet thinks that this is the best way of finding out whether Kapalika is a vampire or not.

They finally reach Kapalika’s home and Inderjeet finds proof that Kapalika is a vampire. The next day, when Aryan is returning home with his girlfriend and Inderjeet’s secretary, Sweetie, Kapalika attacks them and Sweetie turns into a vampire.

How Sanam, Karan, Aryan and Inderjeet fight against the vampire forms rest of the story.

Neighbors: They Are Vampires Review:

Bollywood movie makers have long liked the concept of evil neighbors. Kiran Kumar starred in a movie with almost the same premise back in the eighties, Wohi Bhayanak Raat. Only in that  movie, the neighbor who found out about the vampires was a young man.

Deepak Tijori made a movie back in the nineties, Pehla Nasha, which was about his character witnessing a death while he was on one of his vouyeristic journies with the help of a powerful binoculars.

Coming back to Neighbors: They are Vampires, this movie is too much and too late for the Ramsays. By 2004, almost every one knew the story of Pehla Nasha as well as the original Neighbors, which starred Shia LaBeouf. Horror afficionados would know Wohi Bhayanaak Raat.

They would even make the connections with Kiran Kumar’s portrayal of the vampire with whoever did it in the Ramsay movie, including the attire – full black with a red scarf that rode on until the boots.

But for the first time the art director seems to have failed the Ramsays. Granted, the Ramsays movies were never Hitchcock, but they always allowed the audience to suspend their disbelief  and believe that the monsters, demons and spirits are well and truly here.

In Neighbors: They Are Vampires, when you see that the art director hasn’t even spent enough money to ensure that the whole dining table has real lemons during one of the sacrificing scenes, you know the Ramsays hired someone different this time.

Its not just about lemons, even the weapons and the people in disguise jar the audience instantly to real life. The Ramsays need to get over their TV hangover before they decide to walk into any other horror movie.

It’s difficult and painful, looking at director Shyam Ramsay giving his all to creat the mesmerising, kooky world of movies like Veerana and Tehkhana relegated to a world of fake lemons and fake, plastic swords.

It’s not just the plastic lemons that wil get the goat of a Bollywood Horror Movie fan. The CGI of the movie, apart from a couple of moneyshot scenes is atrocious. A beginner on Adobe Premiere can make those so-called effects.

Watching the Bollywood Horror Movie Neighbors, you wonder whether the Ramsays will ever find people that were as kooky, but as dedicated to create a Ramsayverse that made audiences forget the demons of their real life and watch someone defeating the ones on screen, like their earlier movies.