13 Nights of Hallowe'en: Night #12 Stir of Echoes

Can you smell that? That is the smell of Bacon-y goodness.
The movie is “Stir of Echoes”, a horror with Kevin Bacon. This movie is zero degrees of separation from Bacon, and greatness. Could you expect otherwise with Bacon in a movie based on the 1958 novel by Richard Matheson? Fear not this, the movie does not disappoint. “Stir of Echoes” even takes a solid left-hand--the sinister hand--turn shy of halfway through making for a fresh experience for fans of the novel. “Stir of Echoes” echoes Matheson’s novel, well maintaining the spirit and staying on point, all while changing things up. This balancing act comes from the movie’s writer/director David Koepp. Koepp is also responsible for the Stephen King movie “Secret Window”, and wrote the screenplay for Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man”.

One last note about Koepp, this year’s movies list has included a staggering number of films from writer/directors. “Stir of Echoes” also boasts Jennifer Morrison from “Urban Legends: Final Cut” and TV’s “House” in a scant few memorable scenes. Then there is Kathryn Erbe from TV’s "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" who in an acting sense stands up to Bacon’s performance more than admirably. I would like to make a note about the DVD. The Amazon link should be to the same edition that I bought. If not I don’t know what to say. The DVD that I have has the creepiest menus that I have ever seen. The menu for the special features in particular causes the hair on the back of your neck to rise. Some people wish their movie was this creepy. I give my kudos on the entire movie experience.

Mood: anxious.
Music: Halloween by Helloween off of Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 1.

Anatomy of a Horror Setting #2-17: Mind Games

In a magical horror setting the spell casters need to deal with the same sorts of logistical details in covering their tracks and maintaining a facade of a normal life, as do the empowered in a psychic horror setting. They share more of the strategic considerations beyond that though. In some cases, with the use of certain spells, they share the same abilities of control over others. The first case in point is controlling the minds of others. The magic user’s control over others comes in different forms with different levels of malleability. They can put people into trances where the individual stands or is recumbent and does nothing, not even think. They can make the individual do their bidding. This greater control involves anything from puppeting the person to possessing them.

The first step to most of these forms of controls is snatching the person, or otherwise getting them into the caster’s possession, so that they can work their magic upon them. Once the abduction is achieved, by whatever means, then comes the actual spell or ritual. These spells are just like any other, with any and all of the same requirements. The result of the spell is that the target person falls under the thrall of the caster. A prime example is similar to the control of hypnotic suggestion from the psychics where instructions need to be given to the enthralled. Then a trigger is needed to set off the execution of those instructions, unless what the controlled is supposed to be doing is ongoing. This trigger does not necessarily need to be implanted in the enchanted individual’s mind.

Spell casters have at their disposal spells in the limited, but exceeding useful, category of scrying. Here as with the psychic’s ability to astrally project within the material world, the caster can watch anything they want, anywhere that is not specifically protected from scrying. Since the magic user is watching they can trigger the hypnotic suggestions remotely. This forms a great layer of protection between the caster, the suggestions, and those who might otherwise easily see the influence under which that person is enthralled. This protection comes with some costs attached to it. The caster may not be able to scry at the appropriate time, the amount of control is limited, and the up front planning is heavy. One obvious alternative is to turn to a form of total control such as possession.

Mood: harried.
Music: Bestrafe Mich by Rammstein and Of All The Gin Joints In All The World by Fall Out Boy.

Buy these at Amazon.ca Click Images to Buy

Anatomy of a Horror Setting #14: A Terrifying Example of Complexity and Control

The following is an exercise in pulling together the last two articles of this series along with a smattering of ideas from the rest of the series in one sprawling, spiralling example of horror. It all begins with an average man named Doug. Doug lives an ordinary life. He works a nine to five job while his wife Cynthia works from home and watches their children Melissa and Jake. One night Doug brings home a friend from work, Aaron. Aaron is quiet, polite, and unassuming. Doug and Aaron spend most of their time in the basement where Doug has a small shop set up in which to tinker around with things. Everybody likes Aaron--he's the perfect guest. Within a week Aaron is there every night. Within two weeks he almost never leaves.

Aaron is a powerful and amoral psychic. The first night that the children are out of the house--at a cousin's birthday party--he uses his hypnotic suggestion to convince Doug to stay in the basement. Then he goes to Cynthia in the illusory guise of Doug and tells her Aaron has left and they have some alone time. Going forward Aaron replaces Doug in the night with Cynthia a few times before his next move. He replaces Doug--who merrily works on things in the basement--with all of the family, in his disguise. This part of the first stage of his plan culminates in Aaron convincing the wife and children that he is Doug and Doug is Aaron. The real Doug continues to go to work unaware that anything is wrong. To cover himself and his treachery Aaron begins a new stage in his plan.

Aaron cajoles, convinces, and controls Cynthia to break off contact with her friends and family and has the kids pulled out of the public school system. He alienates Doug's family, and Doug's reclusion except for work pushes his friends away. Then the next-door neighbour mysteriously commits suicide. The house won't sell--stories come out about it being haunted. The house whose lot backs onto the haunted house becomes empty next. Next another neighbour is sent to jail for hiring out, via an intermediary, the murder of another neighbour. Aaron has taken over Doug's entire private life and has no further interference because of the buffer of vacant unsellable homes completely encircling his. Aaron has his own little kingdom, and the kicker is Doug never knew Aaron before that first night.

Mood: sprightly.
Music: Rock & Roll Saviors by Twisted Sister and Never Say Never by Twisted Sister.

Buy these at Amazon.ca Click Images to Buy

Anatomy of a Horror Setting #13: Spying; Influence; Abuse

Welcome to the thirteenth topic in this series, brought to you on the thirteenth day. I would like to stress that though I make comparisons below I am not equating any of these things, or viewing them as being the same level of terrible, whether they be real or fictional.

There are ties between knowledge and power, power and control, and control and abuse of another. It can all be one vicious circle, or a tangled knot where all of these elements bleed together into one. Today, this very instant, people are using the usually annoying, sometimes costly to the target, technical tools of spyware and adware to enforce their control over spouses, significant others, and children whom they are also abusing in physical, sexual, and other psychological manners. They are also using tracking means such as GPS units, medical implants such as RFID chips, and other physical media of the same type. This is frightening stuff, terrible abuses, of not only the people, but also the technology of the modern world, tainting it with such hideous connotations.

These additional forms of control and abuse are easier to spot than other signs, especially after criminal investigation is begun. Enter the psychic to once more hide and obfuscate these heinous acts. A psychic with the right powers can perform these same intrusions of privacy and forms of indirect manipulation. As well, the psychic can subject the victim to more direct methods. Both of these can also be done with much less to actually no evidence. Take the venerable hypnosis as an example. It's amusing to convince galactic militants that the robots they seek aren't the ones standing to the left. It's entirely a nightmare to be incapable of speaking of the torment inflicted upon oneself, or to have criminal investigators unable to see the bruises and scars.

From a control point of view there are several psychic options. The victim can have their mind read for imagined transgressions--the cornerstone of abuse excuses--while the psychic was absent, or to determine plans to escape, or to patrol for impure or improper thoughts. Similarly, remote viewing can be used to monitor and check in on the victim. Changing gears, abusers will often distance their victim from family and friends. What better way to do that than false emotion transmission, altered memories of slights or grievous betrayals, or memory blocks that prevent the person from remembering the victim? Worse yet perhaps, these same techniques can be used to alienate the victim from loved ones, or to not remember them, leaving the victim truly alone with their abuser.

Mood: content.
Music: Laughing in the Hiding Bush by Bruce Dickinson and More Than a Feeling by Boston.

Buy these at Amazon.ca Click Images to Buy

Anatomy of a Horror Setting #10: Paranoia and the Fugitive Mind

Am I paranoid enough with all of these psychics around? If this were a Tweet then this would be the entire message. Or is that just an easy lie? Is it known that such a brief yet illuminating single line is powerful enough to sum up everything that needs to be said on this topic? Or is this an attempt to make believe that it could be enough. Yet, on the other hand, this could be the start of a conspiracy because some people know that other people know this could be untrue, but those other people know what the first group knows so that could make it true. A knows that B knows that A knows what B knows so B pretends not to know what A knows to force A to not know that B knows. Of course this all assumes that B isn't too paranoid, because, of course, some paranoia is good.

Paranoia is chaotic and confusing enough when the paranoid person can only guess that the people out to get them know about certain things. When psychics who can read minds, see emotions, and bring to bear other similar abilities are a reality then just about anyone who wants to know your business can know it. The key to being paranoid--when it is not due to a psychological defect--is knowing something worth someone else's time and trouble to finding out. What that something is, that the person knows, can be many things. It can be a newly discovered fact. It can be that the person witnessed a crime. It can be an association between multiple ideas or multiple people. In all cases though, that knowledge is something someone else either wants, or needs suppressed.

The right psychic can suppress knowledge literally. The ability to remove memories is powerful in some contexts. The existence of such a power also adds another type of paranoia, the kind where something has been done to the "subject" already. Certain memories could have been taken already. This leads to the paranoid idea of having been implanting with things. What those things are range from tracking devices, to biological weapons, to thoughts. Psychic surgery would allow the implantation of objects without scarring, anaesthetics, or excessive time. The memory of the implantation being removed in addition to an incubation time makes for a greater spread of a bio-agent. The implantation of a thought can be false knowledge, a hypnotic suggestion, or a persistent voice.

Mood: cleansed.
Music: Witch-Hunt by Stratovarius and The Rift by Vince Neil.

Buy these at Amazon.ca Click Images to Buy