2. Shooting Scares

Before getting started on the film itself, Peli threw himself into reaching the topic of things that go bump in the night: "The pre-production period involved a lot of research. That was a year before we started physical photography. I read a lot of books on the subject. Many interviews, accounts of exorcisms and stories about haunted homes.

"I looked at all accounts on the topic, so now I have a large library about every angle of haunting, possessions and exorcisms. There are even some good TV shows. So, yes, I got my hands on everything. From my research, I learned the more violent entities are demonic. We wanted to be as truthful as we could be."

Spurred by the material he'd read and his own nocturnal worries, Peli dreamt up the idea for a Blair Witch-style shocker that uses "found footage" and purports to be the chronicle of what happened to Katie Featherston and Micah Stoat in their home during one month in 2006.

The sparring pair are confronted with what appears to be a demonic presence haunting them at night, and it is their differing reactions - Katie is fearful, Micah concerned yet stoked about capturing anything on film - that drive the simple narrative.

"The movie plays on people's primal fears about what happens when you think you're in the safety of your own home, in your own bed while you're asleep and most vulnerable."

And it was in 2006 itself that Peli finally decided to get moving on the movie project. He didn't have deep pockets, and he hadn't approached a studio for backing. He essentially decided to make the film at home, dredging up between $11,000 and $15,000 (reports differ on the budget) for a swift seven-day shoot.

"Basically the entire crew for the original shoot of the movie was myself, my best friend Amir that I've known since I was 13 and my girlfriend I was living with at the time, and she became a reluctant helper because we didn't have a set and were shooting the movie at home, but she did help a lot in every aspect of production.

"The only thing I couldn't figure out how to do on my own was make-up, so I did hire a make-up artist."

It wasn't only the crew that was tiny - Peli's cast is a handful of people, with the focus on Micah and Katie, played by actors who used their own names to give it that extra credibility.

"We did a couple of casting calls and went through a few hundred people. Called in a few to meet them in person. Kate and Micah we auditioned individually and instantly they blew us away. We called them back and put them together for another audition.

"They showed such an amazing chemistry 30 seconds after meeting each other. We started asking them questions about their characters and they just knocked it out of the park.

"If you saw the footage, you would've thought they had known each other for years. They had to have the guy and girl next door feeling and they got it."

The cast also got dragooned into the other side of filmmaking, to boost the reality. "Micah was shooting most of the movie, though in a few scenes Katie was actually operating the camera. Most of the rest of the time, the camera is either stationary on the tripod in the bedroom or sitting on the kitchen counter etcetera."

Keeping the cameras rolling meant that Peli ended up with a lot of footage. "Probably close to 70 hours; it was a lot," he says. "There were also some nights we just had the cameras rolling non-stop. It took about 10 months to edit."

Peli still lives in the house used for the shooting - though it is with a mixture of relief and disappointment that we have to report nothing scary has happened since then.

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