Haunter (1991 film)

"Who's got his own guts to stop the mansion from being haunted?"

- Tagline of the film

Haunter (Cantonese: 鬧鬼 Jyutping: naau6 gwai2) is a 1991 Hong Kong supernatural action horror film written, shot, edited and directed by Marvin Hui in his directional debut. The film stars Yang Yi-Ming as the Singaporean activist Tsam Chi-Ho, and follows Tsam as he finds himself accompanied by two ghostly entities inside a mansion. He learns of a violent event that took place years ago and is sent back in time to prevent it from happening.

The film was released by Golden Flare Pictures on August 1, 1991 to mixed reviews, but the film's commercial success allowed Hui to make more full-length films.

Plot
Singaporean activist Tsam Chi-Ho (Yang Yi-Ming) travels to to prepare a mansion for sale for his father's real estate company. He comes to know that the mansion's caretaker died two days ago from a heart attack due to the house being haunted. Although he refuses to believe this at first, he meets a rag picker (Brandon Chow) telling him that only he will be able to stop the hauntings.

Mysterious things happen over the next few nights, exactly at 3:00 am. Tsam saves himself from a few fatal attacks, hears repeated screams of a woman, sees a girl singing and playing the piano who vanishes when he opens the door; a book drops from a bookshelf on its own and Tsam finds a letter inside. The suicide letter, written by Lam Wing-Shun (Nancy Tso) to her parents, tells her story from 1960 when they left for to attend her brother's wedding and left her behind with her nanny Amanda, a servant and a driver, so that she could prepare for her upcoming exams.

In their absence, her piano teacher Kwan tried to rape her during her lessons. However, she saved herself by hitting him hard with a candle stand on his head, which resulted in his death. Soon, the police corroborated Lam's story, as they found a few personal items and explicit sketches of hers drawn by Kwan in his house. However, Kwan, obsessed with Lam, returned in the form of an evil spirit, killing her servant first, then her driver and last of all, Amanda, leaving her all alone in the mansion. He raped Lam repeatedly for the next six days, who ended up committing suicide in despair. Tsam soon realizes that even after her death, her spirit is trapped and tortured inside the mansion by Kwan's spirit to this day.

After reading the letter, Tsam feels sympathetic and brings a psychic, Mrs. Cheung (Deborah Tsui), to help, but the woman leaves after realising how much evil and obsessive Kwan's spirit is and asks Tsam to do the same, but he ignores her warning and stays there, challenging Kwan by repeating his name (as it is believed that saying an evil spirit's name makes it more powerful). However, Kwan's spirit appears before him, warning him to get out of the mansion and violently throws him out. Tsam tries to get in again, hearing the screams, but Lam's spirit appears before him too, saying that Kwan will never let him free her from his captivity. A tearful Tsam steps back and kneels down in despair before the thundering mansion, echoing with Lam's screams.

Cast

 * Yang Yi-Ming as Tsam Chi-Ho
 * Nancy Tso as Lam Wing-Shun
 * as Amanda Lee Tsam-Yui
 * as Professor Kwan
 * Deborah Tsui as Mrs. Cheung
 * Brandon Chow as the Rag Picker