The filmmaking brothers behind Playhouse return with Black Daruma, a horror film with a dark sense of humour and an inventive twist on the doll subgenre.
Black Daruma follows Ryan, a struggling man in his 30s, who buys a Japanese lucky ‘Daruma’ doll to turn his life around—only to have it spiral out of control in hilariously dark ways. Fionn, one of the directing duo, describes the
film as “Gremlins meets Paranormal Activity,” with a playful yet sinister vibe.
“We shot the whole film from the doll’s POV—it’s like the audience is the doll, watching the madness unfold,” he says.
Shot in just eight days, the film draws inspiration from the found footage genre and is inspired by character-driven horrors like ‘Creep’ and ‘Be My Cat’.
Toby, co-director, notes, “The disorienting POV keep things unpredictable. We wanted a bizarre, voyeuristic descent into imploding masculinity.”
‘’What’s weird,” says Fionn, “is that we wrote the script not knowing that Japanese luck dolls actually exist. Daruma dolls come in different colours and the black one, it turns out, is known for warding off bad spirits, and that just fit perfectly with our story and made the whole thing even more absurd.”
Black Daruma promises a sharp, darkly funny twist on doll horror that will both humour and spook you in equal measure.
Black Daruma is now available to rent or buy on Amazon Prime Video in the US and the UK.
Watch the trailer for Black Daruma below –
Bloody Flicks 