Just what were the Ramsay brothers thinking when they made all those horror movies? The fraternity churned out about a score of horror films in two decades, and while most of these were scary by 1980s standards, none had a menacing feel like Rosemary's Baby or The Blair Witch Project. But then, I am sure the brothers never took the stuff seriously - serious in the Alfred Hitchcock and Roman Polanski way. I have a vague feeling that whenever a new project was announced, the entire Ramsay family would have packed their bags and left for wherever the Kaali Pahaadi actually was. I mean, if the whole family, Gangu, Shyam, Tulsi, Kumar, was out, why would the ladies stay at home? Ajay Agarwal, who played the demon in a lot of Ramsay movies, seems quite a nice chap, and I would not be surprised if Ajay chacha played sport and carried the kids on his shoulders during the family trips.

Probably the best movie that the Ramsays churned out was 'Purana Mandir' (disclaimer: I have not seen their entire filmography). 'Purana Mandir' also had a humorous side plot, which is possibly the best parody of Sholay that I have seen in my life. With Satish Shah as the villain and Sadashiv Amrapurkar as the suspicious watchman, the film anyway ran the risk of degenerating into a comedy (just like I can never watch The Great Gambler seriously because Utpal Dutt plays the villain). Nevertheless, the director did an excellent job of making you sit at the edge of the seat till Samri comes back to life. You always know that nothing can keep the chap back, but Tulsi Ramsay makes it ohh-so-exciting.

The worst was probably 'Band Darwaza', which, as a friend correctly pointed out, loses its charm because the 'bhoot is always running away from male members of the family'. Incidentally, it is also the lowest rated among their films on IMDB (the highest rated is 'Veerana', which I cannot recall because I preferred to stay under the sheets whenever I saw that movie in childhood.). All I can say is that 'Veerana' is supposed to be excellent, as my brother, a veteran of Hindi horror movies, had the best words for it - "I could not go to the bathroom in the dark for four months after I saw Veerana".