Stir of Echoes (1999) | Cult Cinema Circle

oh I saw a guy and got a 2-in needle stuck into his arm while he was under his nose didn't feel okay kesen prove it hypnotize somebody yeah do me no come on what's the worst that can happen close your eyes close [Music] eyes why do I know that song are you okay what the hell did she do to me [Music] I see red he hasn't gone to work he sleeps like 12 hours a night why are you digging the man switch got flipped he's a receiver now she's taking him away she was here what's the problem I see people turn their heads and quickly I look away like newborn baby it just happens every day don't be afraid of it Daddy I look inside myself he can't stop it he can't slow it down he can't even figure it out no whatever door you open in my mind I want you to shut it [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] and welcome to the cult Cinema Circle podcast my name is Jesse and I'll be your host before we get started please make sure you subscribe to the show on your podcast of choice whether that's Apple podcast Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts be sure to give the show five stars and a 1 to two sentence review and tell me what you think if you'd like to follow the show on social media you can do so on Instagram at cult cinemacircle or on Twitter at cult Circle or you can send me an email at cult cinemacircle gmail.com you can also follow me on letterbox at Jesse crmp J KR m P all one word and all social media links will be put in the show notes now on with the show So today we're going to be put under hypnosis we're going to unlock some parts of our brains we didn't even know we had and we're also going to try and like find out the mystery of what's going on with these Visions we're seeing um but with all that being said though today we're going to be covering a little film from 1999 and that is called Stir of Echoes now for me Stir of Echoes goes back a little bit for me I uh I saw this when I was a young child kid I don't really know why I think my mom might have liked like Kevin Bacon or something so maybe she had rented it or something and I we we just had it at the house and so you know I just remember seeing this at a young age and being affected by it in a way I it's not like I was rewatching this a ton or anything but I did really kind of appreciate and like this it was also spooky movie so like of course I was down for that so I definitely wanted to you know uh watch something like that and then you know recently watching it now I really actually enjoyed myself quite a bit I think this movie is very well done I think it is uh you know it's kind of nice because it's also been reclaimed as sort of a little bit of an underrated movie which I definitely think it kind of is and we'll talk a little bit more about why it's underrated yeah and I thought why not like it's 25 years you know now and spread the good word of it I guess you know what I mean uh but as we normally do on the show we're going to talk a little bit about like facts and figures of the movie a little bit about the uh differences between this and the book that it's based off of uh going into the plot all that fun stuff so uh without further Ado let's get into it so before we get into facts and figures I did just kind of want to talk about put a little bit of context on here of what we're looking at in terms of just movies in general in the late 90s um so of course 1999 was a huge movie year that just had a lot of different things going on but in this particular conversation we're going to talk about the horor genre as you know a whole so of course we have scream coming out in '96 and that really changed a whole lot um of the landscape with a lot more uh teen horror coming out and things of that nature um so you know but even in this year you have uh movies like audition in Japan which had premiered I have a episode from earlier this year you can go listen to about that the Blair Witch Project which kind of was a phenomenon especially in the US uh it was a very big found footage movie uh kind of a one of a kind if you will or at that time uh it was definitely important to to see we also have deep blue sea from uh around the summertime I did an episode on that with the boys from the men who like men who like movies so go check that out too uh but then also we have like The Haunting and that was like a remake of a movies from the 60s a British movie but you also have even something like Idol hands as well from earlier in the year which is like horror comedy uh did an episode that as well that was fun uh you have like the rage carry 2 which I think came out maybe after this did but you even have these things of like oh let's try to like reboot a series that doesn't need it maybe a little bit and you would see that sometimes uh for better or worse but even you have stuff like ravenous as well I did an episode on ravenous earlier this year as well with Clayton from men who like men who like movies Triple M pod but you know we we talked more about you know how that became kind of a cult classic movie uh just because uh the production of it was kind of Hell honestly but it ended up being this kind of interesting weird film is like a Neo you know it's like a Neo western or something like that um that's also really gay too which is fun uh but then you also even have some Sleepy Hollow from an established dular like Tim Burton so in terms of horror that's kind of what we're looking at and so I think and of course it's important to note that uh big reason why this movie kind of went under the radar a little bit is because the month before this came out a little movie by the name of the six sents came out I don't know if you've heard of it or not but yeah that also came out and just because for whatever reason it just ended up getting more uh attention than the star of eeko movie did um there's a little bit of similarity in the plot but not like by much necessarily but I I see the vision I understand why the happened but I still think that this movie is wholly still different and I am uh glad to be able to talk a little bit more about it let's get into a little bit of our figures though so this movie came out September uh 10th of 1999 and it comes in about 100 minutes about $12 million budget and then it was artist and entertainment who distributed this so the same people who did the BR Rich Project also distributed this as well um in terms of like the money it made uh during its whole time in theaters it came in at number three with 5.8 million it's opening weekend and then overall it made about $21.1 million so needless to say it wasn't exactly a financial success um but critically it didn't do terribly we're looking at a 68% in Rotten Tomatoes with 1880 reviews and then a 70% on the popcorn meter uh with about 50,000 ratings and then letter box we're at a 3.3 out of five the letter the voice of the people but yeah I think we also need to talk a a little bit about just how a little bit about the source material of this movie so this is a movie that was based off a book from Richard mat for those who may not know Richard mat he is a horror sci-fi writer um not like the same as someone like R Bradberry but not by not far off though I mean he I would also say it's prolific he did the story of I Am Legend um he also did I believe a couple different episodes of the highight Zone the most famous being the one with William Shatner in it a nightmare at 30,000 ft he's done all sorts of different things and he's just been this kind of known writer also fun little fact uh a son of his ended up going off and with his friend created the characters of Bill and Ted so fun little fact on that but yeah he had written star of EO in 1958 now I had not read this book or anything I did get all this information pretty much from the same video from the scare Salon uh shout out Jenny over there and the 13:00 podcast uh she also helps run that as well um she did a fantastic video where she talks about this movie which she also loves and then also talks about the book as well and kind of lists the differences and things of that sort which I I kind of appreciate and like um because makes my job easier um so I like I said I haven't read the book but I would take a look at it why not hell not you know it seems cool but we are going to get into spoilers obviously so be warned I guess um but yeah so let's talk a little bit about the the book in the movie so in the book there's actually the Wallace's so you have Tom Wallace an Wallace and Richard Wallace Richard's a little kid Ann is the wife and then Tom is Tom uh where you have Tom witzky Maggie witzky and then Jake witzky in the movie in the book it takes place in California in 19 late 1950s as opposed to Chicago in like I'm guessing the late '90s I'm assuming we also have different and jobs and just socioeconomic status so Tom in the book is like middle to upper management at a factory near his house in the ' 50s um so they're a little bit well better off uh it's a little bit more of a middle class area as opposed to Tom in the movie where he's a telephone lineman which is more of blue collar job anyway and they are definitely lower middle class they even talk about how you know they're struggling for money a little bit especially since we find out that Maggie is in the movie is pregnant uh in the beginning and Tom isn't exactly thrilled about that one of the things too is uh they go to the party that uh he gets put under hypnosis at and in the book it's actually Tom's younger brother-in-law Phil who actually hypnotizes him because Phil actually is studying psychology at the local um local college or whatever and uh in the movie though uh his sister-in-law uh Lisa played by Eliana Douglas is actually the one who hypnotizes him and she's kind of like a woow woo new Agy type of girl so that's what we have for that um in the book we have Ron and Elsie they're the people who actually throw the party in the beginning as opposed to there's no Ron and Elsie I don't think in the movie The party is thrown by um Frank and Sheila I believe they both have post hypnotic suggestions so in the movie they have uh Ilana Douglas tells him to be more open or be more open-minded and in the book they actually tell him to put his shoe in the fridge or something like that it's a little bit more like it's not it's not as vague as like oh be more open it's more like oh do this thing you know and whatever and then you'll wake up with uh more so like uh how his uh latent Powers manifest in a way uh what happens with Tom in the book is that he's more so sensing a wave of information um and Impressions and he's not seeing like spe specific like Visions or anything as opposed to the movie where he is seeing specific visions that are related to this girl he's seeing right so there's that and in the the victims in both books there is a murder mystery in the book in the movie obviously uh but the victim is an older woman in a black dress in the book as opposed to our young teenage girl Samantha in the movie so we also find out Helen who is the victim in the book um lived in the Wallace's house before they actually moved in as opposed to Samantha who did not live in the house but instead was killed at the house and we'll get more into that we do have the scene here where um in the movie uh Jake is taken by uh Debbie who is Samantha sister while she was babysitting him and he um gets taken to a local Metro station which is like uh the train station pretty much uh as opposed to in the book uh when they get a babysitter for the kid um he literally almost gets straight up kidnapped by a babysitter for no [ __ ] reason so that happens we then also have our characters of Frank and Sheila like I mentioned earlier so they have a son Adam in the movie um as opposed to there is Frank and Elizabeth in the book but they do not have a kid but these are still friends or Frank is a friend of Tom's in the book as well and then we have in the book as well we have Harry and Mildred Harry and Mildred are just Neighbors in the um in the area where Tom lives as opposed to Harry and Kurt in the movie where Harry is actually the landlord of um Tom's Place and and all this so that's a little different as well um in the book though we also have that uh Elizabeth so Frank's wife uh shoots Frank and says it was an accident actually um so that is like some drama that comes up in the book and in the movie we have that Adam who is the son of Frank and Sheila the analog um actually shoots himself in the chest uh from guilt and is put into critical condition and then also we have again the the murder Myster kind of ties up with like uh in the book Elizabeth remember it's Frank's um wife uh killed Helen because Helen was having an affair with both Harry and Frank so she was just kind of the town you know Floy or whatever um so that's why Elizabeth killed Helen and then like hit her body and then what happens in the movie is that Frank and Harry with their respective son Sons they cover up a crime that their sons have committed and so you know that's how the murder mystery kind of becomes solved in a way and again uh Tom has a a part in in that because of his you know psychic abilities and everything that have been unlocked so there's that so that's that's the differences you know generally between the book and the movie I do agree with uh especially what Jenny says in her video not that I've read the book or anything but from what I understand I think this is just a more focused approach in the movie um because there's different things that happen in the book you know it's not like it's you're going to be spoiled either way um if you read the book and don't you know then read you know watch the movie they're not the same thing necessarily there are elements throughout but it's not like it's a pace by Pace kind of adaptation or anything which is cool you know but that's the differences between the book and the movie and all that I probably would read the book to be honest I wouldn't be opposed to it but you know that's just me I guess so talking a little bit more about just like some of our casts and our crew so we have David Coop who is our director he is a writer so he um actually wrote like Jurassic Park and a couple different things as well but he's uh well known for uh doing a movie called you should have left which actually brought back I believe um Kevin Bacon and I think kathern Herby if I'm not mistaken and he also did Secret Window as well with a think was either was it Johnny dip I think that was um the number 23 I think was Jim Carrey so I was like oh okay which one's which so you have that you then have David Coop who also helped write this and Andrew Kevin Walker who technically did not get a credit on this but he still did a little bit of script doctoring on it um of course David coab uh as I stated already he had done like Jurassic Park and Spider-Man I believe and then you have like Andrew Kevin Walker who did like seven and like Sleepy Hollow and stuff like this so yeah that's what we're talk talking about in terms of writing the composer of this is James Newton Howard he actually did The Dark Knight and also pretty woman um composing as well our cinematographer is Fred Murphy he actually shot Freddy versus Jason which you'll hear about more uh later this month when I am covering uh a bunch of movies from Friday the 13 spoiler that's what you're going to be hearing next week um but you know there's that but he also shot The Moth Man prophecy which is a pretty cool little movie um I actually watched that last year and he also did Soul Survivors um from like 2000 which is awful horror movie with Elijah duu in it but um that whole thing I just hate that movie so much it's not very good at all um you don't watch it anyway but uh the editor is also uh she is Jill savit um she actually edited Buffy the Vampire Slayer from 1992 and also Secret Window as well was so was brought back by David coop which is cool and then some of our casts as well so we have Kevin Bacon as Tom he of course was from Foot Loose Tremors Wild Things Friday the 13th all the things so you know I think he does a really good job in this film Katherine Herby she had been in she had been on TV I think or whatever she was also in whatab about Bob which I have no idea what that movie is but apparently she was in it um but she had gone on to then be an assassination nation which I loved that movie and also a movie called the addiction which came out before this did and that's a lily Taylor vampire movie you should go check out if you're ever if you're interested in vampires or if you're interested in Lily Taylor or both then Ilana Douglas is playing Lisa in this movie um so that is uh the sister to miss Maggie uh she's from Ghost World the new guy just all the things that she's been in and uh then you have Kevin Dunn who plays Frank he is from like Small Soldiers and Godzilla from 1998 uh then Jennifer Morrison who plays Samantha in this our ghost girl she is from the sequel of urban legend uh which is urban Legend's Final Cut and also she was in the Star Trek movie and then Lisa wild who plays Debbie her sister is actually uh so she had gone on and done some other work but I actually just watched her either earlier this year or end of last year in the movie The Passenger with Kyle gner and Johnny burcht told she plays kind of a big role in that in a way but uh you know it's it's a fascinating little movie and I didn't realize who she was at first and then when I rewatched this movie I was like oh damn that's like the one sister girl so love that for me love that um but yeah so uh as I stated a star of eeko had been written by Richard mat and David Coop was a really big fan of his um and Coop decided he wanted his next project after this movie he had done which was called uh the trigger effect he wanted it to be a horror movie like he wanted to do a horror movie um he loved like duel from 1971 which was also a Richard mat novel a little short story that had been um one of the feature film uh debuts of Mr Sten Spielberg um he also loved like uh his work from like the Twilight Zone and everything so definitely he was like oh my God I want to adapt this and that's what we're going to do uh Gavin poone who I think also plays like a little cameo in this movie as well um he is secure the rights to the book and coep remembers being a little high strung when he approached matis in it asking him what he thought about the script and all that um he was terrified that the changes that he made in the story might displease the author and instead Richard mat was like super nice and he actually really liked the trigger effect he had seen it before and he gave him his approval and he pretty much said I'm sure he's done a great job of it I know what he's done before and it's quite good uh he has a very good touch is what he had said about David Coop so that's kind of nice um some of the influences for this film in particular were like Roman pinsky's repulsion and also Rosemary's Baby and then also The Dead Zone from David cronenburg as well I have not seen I have seen Rosemary's Baby I have not seen repulsion or The Dead Zone um so I don't really know what I yeah we we'll get we'll talk about it but like yeah I I don't know what the references are necessarily but uh I'll take their word for it obviously this was produced like I said by artists and entertainment on a budget of $12 million uh principal photography took place in Chicago and it lasted 39 days uh between October 5th and November 22 21st of 1998 uh Brian dealma actually paid a visit to set and offered David some ideas uh one of which was shooting a long take of Kevin Bacon during the first half of a long dialogue sequence um he actually shot the hypnosis scene in which bacon envisions himself in a theater and everything apart from uh the production screen is painted black as it was in Richard matson's book um he felt that uh many hypnosis scenes in films are like skipped by so he came up with the idea of allowing people to like look at the point of view from like Kevin Megan as he's undergoing hypnosis to make this seem more fresh and that theater that they had shot the sequence in was in Joliet Illinois um which is right outside Chicago it's like suburb of that and also there's a well-known scene where uh Kevin Megan pulls out a tooth of his um this was actually based off of a nightmare that David had had about dying of old age and it was a practical effect um Co-op said to Entertainment Weekly that we blacked out Kevin's tooth and built a cap to go over it so he's pulling out a cap that comes off fairly easily and he gives some Grunts and groans and we add grotesque crunching flesh noises while he's pulling out the tooth he's also palming a real tooth in his other hand to then drop in the sink and he drops the real tooth we tilt down to see it and then someone darts in from off camera with a washcloth and wipes the blood off of Kevin's face so that he looks back up in the mirror his face and his teeth are clean so it's a little bit about just like some fun production history I don't really have much else I mean um the young boy who plays uh Jake was brought in from New York uh they had tried other child actors and they were just like no he he works pretty well he also looks kind of like Kevin Bacon in a weird way so cool great uh this obviously could have been a way if it wasn't going to be you know a son I mean you could have brought s bacon in for this why not you know but uh you whatever it's all good but yeah so uh but that's a little bit about production I don't really have that much like else crazy to like talk about I guess so let's dive a little bit into our plot shall we to talk a little bit about this I already kind of talked about it a little bit anyway but I'm just going to go through this real quick so Tom witzky played by Kevin Bacon is a telephone lineman living in a workingclass neighborhood in Chicago with his pregnant wife Maggy played by Katherine Herby and his son Jake played by Zachary David cop I believe uh uh tell me if I'm wrong on that I I'm just getting that off the top of my head but uh and his son possesses the ability to commune with the dead although neither Tom nor Maggie really know about this uh special ability yet though at a party across the street one evening Tom challenges Maggie Sister Lisa played by Elana Douglas who's a believer in the Paranormal Activity uh to hypnotize him because again she's kind of new Agy and woo woo a little bit uh but after putting him under Lisa plants a post hypnotic suggestion in Tom urging him to quote be more open-minded and after this Tom then experiences violent visions of a scuffle that happens with a girl who he learns is uh a girl named Samantha kak who is a local 17-year-old girl who disappeared from the neighborhood about 6 months beforehand and I believe um I'm trying to remember exactly like when this all happened but yeah I think this is supposed to be like uh September October I guess is when the movie is set so this happened at least in the colder months and all that but we'll talk about that um well Tom and Maggie they go to a high school football game um Jake is overheard by his babysitter Debbie played by Le a while um as he speaks with Samantha um Debbie gets upset and he she snatches Jake running off with him into the night Tom senses that Jake is in danger and he sees strange flashes of red light that lead him to a Metra Station a local train station where Debbie is speaking with her mother um about Jake and when Tom and Maggie confront this lady um with a police officer now present uh Debbie angrily questions them about her sister Samantha explaining that pretty much what happened is she has an intellectual disability um that leaves her with the mental capacity of an eight-year-old and thus a child's tendency to like trust strangers so Tom becomes obsessed with Samantha and um because he realizes that's who this girl he's seen the Visions are and he begins probing different people in his community about her disappearance this then attracts the attention of his landlord Harry um demone um or Damon and his friend Frank McCarthy who is Kevin Dunn um and the respective Sons Kurt um Damon and also Adam McCarthy um who they all dismiss her pretty much as a Runaway Teen um and after another prophetic uh Vision in which Frank tells Tom that they're going to kill you and Maggie both Tom finds that uh what had happened is that Adam Frank's son shot himself in Frank's home in the chest and is now in critical condition during an afternoon walk uh Jack and Maggie they encounter a funeral of a police officer where these policemen are there and they're saluting and a policeman named Neil um recognizes Jake's unique ability and he invites Tom to a private Gathering of like-minded people to learn more about what's going on with with his son Maggie goes to the beating instead though and Neil tells her that the spirit that contacted Tom has asked for something and will grow upset if he does if it it pretty much doesn't get done um and as predicted Samantha begins plaguing Tom leading to his insomnia so he's not going to work and like all this stuff and Samantha is telling him to dig and Tom complies and he's digging holes in his backyard um and is tearing up the house to try to appease The Ghost and all this so during the course of the digging and everything uh we find out that Maggie's like grandmother uh passes away and this requires Maggie and Jake to leave for the Wake even though also Tom does not go um but well uh Jake and Maggie are going to this wake at a relative's house about an hour uh out of the city I guess Tom inadvertently uh knocks down a shoddy brick wall in the basement with a jackhammer he bought and um he discovers the mummified remains of he then receives a vision after touching her corpse um showing him that pretty much before his family had moved in uh during snower months uh Adam and Kurt had actually lured Samantha into the house to rape her because again uh Kurt's dad is the landlord so he had access to it so when she resisted though they unintentionally suffocated her and hid her body so they accidentally killed her pretty much and Tom brings Frank back to the scene of the crime to the basement to close this and Frank breaks down he admits that Adam and Kurt had already told him all of this um and that they confided with him and Harry about this Frank pulls out a gun and he demands to be alone um so Tom goes back upstairs and you just hear a single gun shot so because I guess Kurt had seen all of this and the discovery of the body if you will um Harry and Kurt they come over in corner Tom with the intention of killing him cuz he found out their secret but Maggie interrupts because she comes back home to try to like bring Tom to the funeral thing um and as Harry takes her hostage Frank emerges and fatally shoots Kurt and Harry and Tom notices uh Samantha's Spirit smile and finally disappears and then afterwards the family moves out of the house and Samantha's mother and her sister are able to finally give her a proper burial and as the witk are driving off to their next location Jake is now having to cover his ears because he's overwhelmed by all the spirits that linger in the houses that pass by so that is like the basic plot of the film I guess uh but yeah so a little bit about just talking about some of the themes in this film so I think this is definitely trying to explore things like hypnosis obviously um that's a really big part of that and I don't really know how many movies have ever really covered hypnosis like that but I do kind of appreciate that they did something a little different with this and there showing it I think it's a really interesting kind of way of doing this and also of course the Supernatural is touched upon here what I think is interesting too is that just Suburban paranoia kind of going with this because that really comes back with Tom um I think it was David Coop who said this or maybe was ilon Douglas or somebody on some bonus features that I've seen on YouTube for this film it's interesting you can kind of tie this back to like this is the story of Tom who's kind of going through a bit of a midlife crisis um and instead of him like you know [ __ ] like a inappropriate 20-year-old or something right um instead of that he is uh being beckoned by a uh Teenage ghost so you know Different Strokes for different folks I guess but yeah I just thought that was kind of an interesting way of looking at it because it is kind of that and and that's the whole sort of thing is like Tom is going through something where he doesn't feel like his life is as awesome as he thought it would have been and you know even though I think Maggie's perfectly fine with it like he fine with having a kid and being with him and like all this but he wanted more from his life he thought he would be so much cooler or whatever the [ __ ] and you know that's just what's really interesting is that it's also looking at that in a way and I think it's you know this is just making him go a little more insane than you know maybe you like normally if someone's going through a midlife crisis they're like you know maybe going to like cheat on their spouse or something or they might like be Reckless with the money that they have like they go and buy like some [ __ ] you know like they go by some [ __ ] Ferrari or something like that you know what I mean so you know but this is just something a little different and it just shows that like you know uh this every man that we think of with Tom you know he's being drawn into this extraordinary circumstance you know and and again it was always within him we see this with his son his son obviously has these like psychic abilities but his uh him and his wife do not notice them at all for some reason and I don't know why but okay but uh yeah it's just but it's it makes sense that it would be that he would have these Powers if anything so it's just interesting it took just like being kind of dared into doing it and be like what's the worst that can happen you know so I I just thought that was interesting if anything so a little bit about the visuals and like the sound design of this I think the visuals of this movie are so well done especially with the scenes talking about like hypnosis and showing hypnosis I think you know if that's what the book had shown or whatever I thought that was very well done just the idea of like your brain being a movie theater and like having this like be kind of like the visions of your your life and what you're seeing I thought that was very interesting which was really cool and also the super natural Visions throughout this as well um once you know what happens in the end it is just kind of a nice like uh you know kind of bow on everything but they are very unsettling and they're very weird like one of the ones that stands out to me is when um you have the kid Adam who is uh shooting himself in the chest but in the little vision that Tom has it's like he shoots himself and then he like smears his blood alliv face and that was just like [ __ ] freaky to me I was just like Jesus Lord and I was just watching this like what last week or something and I was like uh I don't know what's going on here but like okay got it um but yeah I I think those uh and I also think this is shot very well I think Fred Murphy did a really good job because it just feels uh feels creepy and just like of the way they did some of the special effects and a lot of this stuff's very like in camera and I really appreciate that because it makes it that much more unsettling and I really enjoy that and yeah I think also like the sound design a little bit just like some of the stuff like you know when like Tom pulls out his tooth for example or even just some of the different things like especially during the vision of Samantha's death which is we'll talk about that I'm sure but like the use of sound in that and just making everything's just it makes it feel a lot more visceral to me and um cuz that particular death scene is always very unsettling to me um and I'm like a huge horror fan and I am kind of desensitized a little bit but that uh throws me off a little bit and I will say that much but yeah so but I thought the visuals of this were really well and you know the sound design also works really well too a little bit just about like the uh critical reception as well uh we'll talk about that so many of the reviewers felt like this film suffered obviously I talked earlier with it having come out after the Blair Witch Project and also the six sense and also the mummy as well um so for example Sarah Vorhees who was a reviewer said uh gave it the benefit of the doubt because the movie or at least the story of it um appeared long before the six sense so that's cool uh Roger Ebert wrote that uh bacon stars in one of his best performances and that Co-op screenplay dovet Tales the supernatural stuff with developments Among The Neighbors which are wisely more sad and tragic than sensational um Empire giving this a four out of five uh wrote excellent and wrote that this quietly creepy adaptation of a Richard mat novel was overshadowed at the American box office by the six sense and adds that there are neat camera tricks The Spook moves at a slightly different film speed to the living and a couple of uh great bad dream moments but the real skill Co-op has is that he grounds the scary stuff in a believable reality and delivers a ghost story that doesn't lose its grip after the Spirits have unambiguously been made manifest you then also have the Seattle Post Intelligencer who wrote that the film offers above average occult entertainment with Bacon's most believable heart-wrenching and charismatic lead performance in many years and there's a couple of different you know uh reviews we could talk about but even just those ones um I do kind of like that and I want to talk a little bit uh on that where I like that this is not like a typical GH story it's not this typical Gothic ghost story of like a big house with like you know these people and like there's ghosts all around or there's these like not ghosts all around but like you know there's you know the vibe right like it's just this kind of thing I enjoy that this is something where it feels more working class it feels a little bit more down to earth if anything and I think that's why a lot of people really like that because you feel like with these char you feel like you know them um and I definitely feel like I know them in a way and so it makes it more all the more interesting to follow what's going on with them as opposed to like in the book where you have people who are kind of a little bit well well off um at that time so you know it's kind of like okay you're having a ghost I guess but like who cares you know but in this you're like oh no I feel like I sort of know these people or or I can I can put myself in their shoes if you will the critical uh consensus on Rotten Tomatoes of this is Kevin Bacon's acting is so genuine that it's creepy and director David Coop knows how to create true suspense uh that was the consensus that was on Rotten Tomatoes and I do kind of agree with that um just to talk a little bit about some of the other scenes so like I said um some of the stuff that makes me unsettled was like the little vision that uh that Tom was having before he finds Adam and shooting himself in the chest but I will also say that the more for me the unsettling part I stated already was Samantha's death scene because that has always kind of just like been in the back of my brain and it just like kind of screws with me um and if you've seen it well I'll talk a little bit about it is that you find out that you know um Samantha is this girl she gets alerted into this house by these boys really more so Curt than anything Kurt is the one who's really uh trying to rape her pretty much Adam is just kind of going along with it because it's his friend and he feels pressured but it just it it feels un it feels unsettling and it just feels like bad news bad news right and so I think that was what really kind of got me in a way is it was just it feels a little real for me it feels a little too real um where it's not like you know Jason with a you know Mich Tedy or fing you Freddy krer with his like glove hand right you know what I mean like this this [ __ ] happens like this feels a little bit more real and that's what makes this creepier you know to to me at least um because anything that you can kind of feel a little bit more you can feel a little bit more it feels more realistic that's what makes it interesting and and you know but that it just unsettles me it creeps me out if anything you know so I I will never kind of get that out and just and it's sad if anything it's just tragic and it's it's you know doesn't make you feel the best um which is kind of the whole point it's supposed to be a dread right like and um CU she sure as hell didn't want to die either and all that so a little bit of just like production little antecedants if you will um so some fun little behind the scenes kind of things uh one of the fun little things is that uh there was a a scene where you know Kevin Bacon's digging and all that stuff and he gets into a fight with his wife and he like storms off and like he uh is trying to I think he's trying to replace the hose he's using he runs out of water and then he's trying to put it in another spigot and it's not working and he ends up going into his house but beforehand he kicks a bucket and because he's pissed off and so he kicks the bucket and what ends up happening is that that the bucket flies into a window and breaks the window and that was not supposed to happen actually funny enough and it's just like kind of weird um but yeah so there was like that kind of a thing you also have like for example like uh during when they are when Maggie's going back home and there has to be a scene where like uh her her son is like uh you know watching her leave the the wake and to go back home uh they had actually already worked the kid who was cast already enough to where they could legally do it um so they had to F find a kid um who was also living in the area I guess to like kind of be a standin for him in a way to also do some of the the shooting if you will which is kind of funny so there's that sort of thing I think also too um what's cool about this set is that David Co because he's a writer and because he also did write the movie technically like he kind of let the actors do a little they I think he let them not improv too much but I think he definitely like seemed to trust them a little bit more um especially when you have people like Kevin Bacon like Ilana Douglas even like people who've been on sets and everything um especially when you can have somebody uh maybe even bring something that you didn't even you weren't even thinking of or like oh my god I didn't even think to do it that way but like you made something better you know um so it was cool that he was able to allow for those who of things and it wasn't just so you know uh precious to the script if anything and then of course like you know just some references to Horror in general um definitely some you know The Shining Vibes obviously uh what with the character of Neil we'll talk about that in a minute uh but you know you have that um The Dead Zone I think also apparently with like the uh scene where Kurt is like trying to get um Jennifer Morrison's character to come in the house that's also kind of a direct rip from that or like for example like the Incredible Shrinking man or the shrinking man the book that Debbie is reading while she's watching Jake and everything that's a Richard mathson novel so it's like these little things here and there um but yeah I mean if anything like this was David Coop's kind of first foray into actually directing a horror movie so I'm sure you know you wanted to have like little things here and there plus then you also have like somebody who had been in a slasher movie before it's like you're leads so that's kind of cool you know and and what is that you know um but yeah I mean like I think the most of what I enjoyed in this movie in particular I would say overall I really liked the atmosphere of this I just like that this feels unsettling and creepy you know overall which is always appreciated in this but again like I said I like that this is a horror movie that is very much uh kind of about a working class area and it is a ghost story that does not feel uh unrelatable which is which is good and I appreciate that I think that's a a big thing and and that's why this movie you know I think resonates with a different people um because it feels like you know these folks like I said earlier so I think that was something real big I also just think like a lot of the performances were pretty decent I think all of the actors did a pretty good job at what they were brought to do um and I think the writing was pretty decent as well you know I think David Coop did a really good job with this and I'm glad for that plus again like I said I like the you know the shots of this I think it's shot very well shot interestingly um and all of this and also uh I mean the score is nothing to really like write home about necessarily I do like the painted black little cover that they have um I do like that much it was in the trailer you heard earlier but yeah there was that but there I do like a quite a few different parts of this I will say maybe the things I didn't enjoy as much again you know like Maggie's a cool character don't get me wrong but there's also part of me where I'm just like uh she is strong but I also feel like I don't know I would have liked a little bit something different from from Maggie I guess um but that's not like the hugest criticism of that my big thing is that I didn't quite understand what the hell was going on with the character of Neil I feel like that was just kind of like you know picked up and dropped in a way and I didn't really like that you know of course there is this this Trope of like kind of the um magical person of color if you will who you know is all knowing and wise or whatever very much like Scatman CS from like The Shining or whatever would be like the that would be like the the analog if anything but like it you know it just it feels like it doesn't go much of any place and that is just really unfortunate cuz I'm kind of like I wish it did some way but it is what it is and that's just not that's not something I enjoyed that much um I just don't think it went anywhere I will also say too I think Jennifer Morrison does a decent job in her role as Samantha I will also say though I mean like just the idea of like how this girl who ended up going missing and got murdered she was intellectually disabled or whatever so I just it was a little hard to kind of get that a little bit I guess um I don't know if that translated as much I don't think it was necessarily Jenna for morison's fault perhaps but like I don't think it was but I'm just kind of like oh okay so she's supposed to be like intellectually challenged in a way and she's more trusting and you know all this but I was like did we need that I guess like I don't know and again I'm not getting into like whether it's aist or not any of this kind of stuff that's not what this conversation is about I just thought I was like okay like I probably could have gone without it like you know again this feels a little bit more real to me and it feels like something like that that happened to Samantha is not out of the ordinary for something to happen like that so that's what makes it creepy anyway but having that kind of aspect in there I was like okay all right but yeah but overall though I mean like it does hold up in my opinion pretty well I mean it's been 25 years since it's come out but I really do think like it has been able to kind of have a a legacy of sorts really um I still think it's pretty you know um I think the themes of this and just the style of it I think it's still works pretty decent um and that's always really nice because you know like I would love to see this kind of in like a a 4K sort of thing like I wouldn't mind seeing that I think it'd be kind of cool actually to see what it would kind of look like but yeah I I think that would be kind of an interesting uh thing to have with it but but yeah I think that would be kind of just nice to see and it would be but I do think like this still can resonate with people um because it's always interesting to see different ghost stories and to see even just like like I was talking earlier with like hypnosis and we don't get enough hypnosis and um horror I feel like and I I kind of I wish we did a little bit you know and if anything I don't know if it maybe would have like if it had been released like today right like what would it do I don't know if it could have been released today I don't know the the Cinematic landscape is so different now and in a weird way that I'm just kind of like I don't know like could it have could it have done all right you know it could it have worked um I don't quite really I don't quite know it's kind of hard to to predict Dad if anything I did also just want to touch on um a article from Bloody Disgusting that I got from an Arthur pa uh from September 11th of 2020 and this is star of Echoes is an affecting ghost story with an incredible Kevin Bacon performance which was part of the column of formative fears um I'll link it in the show notes below but Paul goes on to talk about you know how this movie got for shadowed by the six sense and you know all that kind of stuff you can read it for yourself but I do want to kind of just highlight the two paragraphs that end the article so Paul is quoted as saying had David Coop's movie been released at an earlier time maybe its fate would have been different regardless his approach to the source material is Deft he finds a healthy balance between cinematic spooker and compelling character work among a set of talented actors Kevin Bacon shines as the every man looking for something bigger and better this is easily one of his finest and most charismatic performances to date star of echo is not scary in the traditional sense of the word but it is haunting whether it be a family traversing the uncertainties of Life a child catching a glimpse of a harsh reality he's aging into or a person losing everything in an instance because of human Nature's Dark Side the film understands anxiety stemming from the unknowable what puts a discouraged mind at ease though is realizing that even if we're no longer in it this messy world still remembers and hears us it means it seems like the least someone can ever do but to a troubled soul looking for a little help listening can mean everything so I kind of like how that was all summed up in that article and and I think this is something where this movie is very haunting to me and it is very much like that's what's kind of cool about it is that it lives in that and it you know is okay in that and I really generally like that which is nice and I think that's why this movie has kind of gone on to be seen as sort of this underrated gem if you will or or an underrated Masterpiece or or whatever I don't know I feel like I'm gassing it up so much but like no it's like this underrated little thing and and again it's because it kind of came out at maybe not an opportune time perhaps but I also think like this movie if anything like the strengths of it is that it came from somebody who really did want to uh adapt This creepy novel and he was able to do so um this uh David coop is obviously a fan of horror in some way um I think that's very very it's very you know telling for that and it's always nice when you see people who who have a reverence for it um which is cool and it just makes it that much more interesting to watch and I just think like this is something where I think more people should watch it and I'm glad that it's get it's du as like something that people have looked back on and they're like oh no I really did like this I really did enjoy it and I really hope they're able to come out of it and you know uh keep enjoying it and hopefully that makes you want to check out other Richard matis and stuff and maybe you didn't know about this but maybe he ends up being like somebody you really like and you want to read more about or you want to read more of his stories or or whatever um I think that would be something that I would maybe kind of do I mean I have no idea what I Am Legend about but like maybe I would go and watch it now because I'm like well hell why not like if that guy could make this like if this is his story like let's go see what that story is or or whatever so but yeah I think overall just I really like this film I think it's like a nice little film you know especially for like the spooky season in a way I don't know much about the roblo like sequel that exists uh star of eeko 2 homecoming I don't know about that one uh but I think this one is on a perfectly good little Island by itself and I'm cool with that um so yeah I I just want more people to know about it I did watch it on hoopla so with your library cards you could watch this perhaps if it's streaming where you're at um which is cool I think it does make the round sometimes I saw it on Tu a couple months ago um so I would definitely pull up on it there um again hoopla has no ads so like you can you know watch it on there if you wanted to if you have your library card um but yeah I just think this is like a super cool little movie and I am very glad to be covering it and I am just interested for more people to see it and to talk about it and to be able to to sing the Praises of of Kevin Bacon and and all this I I really liked him in this movie and I think like yeah it was a good time and it it makes me just want to see what else Richard Matson had done and how his stuff has been adapted and all this kind of fun stuff so yeah I think that's that's kind of that but yeah I mean but please uh listeners let me know what you think of SAR of Echoes did you like this movie did you hate it uh were you in the middle about it do you love the book more or whatever you know tell me all about it you know um also I'd like to pose a question to all y'all as we stated already this is kind of seen as sort of an underrated little thing from you know you know uh the '90s if anything so I want to know a little bit about like what are some of your favorite other like '90s underrated gems you know what I mean uh I want to hear about that because I I want to see what else you're kind of thinking and and I'd love to hear about that um and you know it's always nice if I maybe have never seen it I've seen a lot of different late 90s films because it's kind of my [ __ ] I you know because I was born then so like of course I'm going to be like oh my God I need to watch these horror movies from the 90s right but uh yeah and this is definitely one that I would always recommend to somebody who might be interested in horror or getting into it I it's not too scary but it's you know it has a creep factor in there but yeah I just think it'd be super fun yeah to wrap it up all you know nice and a bow today uh so please you make sure you follow the show on social media give me five stars and one two interview on your podcast CH of choice all that I'm all over the place so you heard all of that in the beginning so I don't need to reiterate it again but please do so it does make a difference um and all but for next week we're going to keep on this ooky spooky train and we're going to be covering uh it's going to a two-parter actually uh so I am covering the whole of the Friday the 13th franchise so that's right me and my buddy Pickin Binger favorite guest of the show obviously for all the horror things but uh we actually had a whole [ __ ] conversation about the Friday the 13th franchise all 12 of those films and uh you know we're going to break up into two episodes the first episode will be the eight Paramount movies and then the LA other episode is going to be the four movies that are not par Paramount movies we talked for uh literally 4 hours so it won't all be 4 hours like all together it'll be brok up into two like I said but yeah uh and because Friday the 13th is next week so you won't be hearing it on Wednesday actually fun little thing I'm actually going to be releasing it on Friday the 13th so if you've listened this far you will know that but you'll see it on social media too but yeah so that'll be your little treat for Friday the 13th everybody is I'm going to talk about my sweet Swampy boy Jason and I'm very excited to talk about it because I thought we had a great conversation we just talk about all the movies and everything we even talk about like what we want to see from the series and what we want to see happen and all this CU we are both kind of fans of the series so but yeah that's what you have to get you know to uh that's what you have to look forward to so yeah please pull up on that next week as always thank you for taking the time to listen to The Cult Cinema Circle podcast and remember I didn't marry you because you were going to be famous I like the way your ass looked in jeans take care bye [Music]