Flickers on the Wall: A Dead Month

January is a dead month. Outside my window the trees are barren, except for a few Georgia pines, dreaming of better days, and the grass displays nothing but shades of brown. The sky is gray, and the only wildlife is a pair of feral cats who’ve decided my porch provides better protection from the elements than my neighbors’. Even here in the South, the air is chill, and there is little in nature to lighten the spirits. Can there be a better time for ghosts?

Without question, ghost stories are my favorite form of horror. I’ve never been afraid of Eastern Europeans with unusual dental work or guys with excessive hair growth tied in with lunar cycles. Not that I don’t enjoy all the classic monsters; I just can’t take them seriously. As for lumbering dullards with cheap masks and machetes, they just make me giggle or more often sigh and get up in search of a better movie. But ghosts, those are a different matter. The unexplainable and generally pissed off dead, ah, those match the chill in the January air.

Strangely, the early age of cinema didn’t see it that way. The undead and mad doctors were well represented in silent horror, and serious movies featuring vampires, zombies, werewolves, mummies, and knife-wielding fiends were churned out in the ‘30s, but ghosts only appeared in lighter fare. In Topper, the screwball Kerbys (Cary Grant, Constance Bennett) stuck around after a fatal car wreak to perform a good deed. Here Comes Mr. Jordan returned lovably, dim, boxer Joe Pendleton (Robert Montgomery) to Earth to find a new body after an incompetent angel harvested him prematurely. The ‘40s continued the trend (The Canterville Ghost, Blithe Spirit) while ratcheting up romance (The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Portrait of Jennie).

Specters finally got their chance in the graveyard ring in 1944, and while it took a few years for real haunts to outnumber Casper’s cousins, the stage was set. The movie was The Uninvited, and it changed horror. I’m not going to extol its virtues here. I’ll leave it as a given that it is one of the best horror films—or films, without the qualifier—ever made, and dwell instead on its importance. It wasn’t just a spokesman (spokesmovie?) for a new type of film; it became the mold for almost every haunt picture that followed.

The template: One or more leads, generally with no apparent link to apparitions, enter a haunted area. At first the supernatural activity is slight, and our “heroes” don’t believe, but minor sounds and movements give way to life-threatening ghostly action, forcing them into detective mode. Uncovering the tragic events that lead to the haunting, they confront the ghost(s) with their new knowledge, which either causes it to leave or causes our leads to realize that there’s nothing they can do. Sometime in the closing chapter, there is a twist which often causes the viewer to see the entire film differently. That’s the story of The Uninvited, and I would have to commit to substantial research to find a haunting movie that varies from that pattern by more than one factor. Poltergeist, Candyman, The Fog, Ghost Story, and The Sixth Sense all tell the same tale—only the ornamentation is different. Things aren’t different when you leave the U.S. Ringu, which started the J-Horror movement, is another rendition of The Uninvited.

None of this is meant as negative criticism of ghost flicks. There are few completely original stories in all of film or literature in general. I can come up with a template for every sub-genre in horror. Mad scientists, werewolves, zombies, alien bugs, etc. all have a single master script. Vampires are special in having two (the form changed when the monster switched from being a horrific fiend to being a great gothic date). It isn’t about originality but about style.

Of course feature films are constrained by monetary concerns. It’s short film that can play with unusual concepts and create a new and innovative ghost story… Or maybe not. I don’t think it’s possible to make a movie about supernatural visitations that doesn’t borrow from The Uninvited. I can’t think of such a plot any more than feature filmmakers. And it appears short filmmakers can’t either. Again, it’s all about style. While the best shorts generally tell different stories than features, that isn’t possible when there’s only a single story to tell. So what you find is abbreviated takes. Considering how features can drag, a quick version can be refreshing. What is often missing is the unraveling of the mystery. There’s not enough time to hunt down clues, so the secrets are announced instead of discovered.

OK, I lied. I keep saying its all just style, but it isn’t. If it were, then you should watch The Uninvited and forget the rest. Nope, every film offers its own pleasures as it rearranges the familiar. So, how are things being rearranged on the indie short scene? I’ve chosen a few of the best ghost shorts to represent the state of phantasmal fright.

There’s no better spot to begin than with Framed (18 min. Director: Jeff Consiglio Writer: Veronica DiPippo,). It is such a pure strain. Sarah’s committed suicide, leaving a farewell note to her boyfriend and Jackie, her roommate. Both are upset, all the more so because they had a brief affair that could have played a part in Sarah’s depression. But the death is pretty straightforward, until candles extinguish themselves and doors swing shut.

Well shot and well acted, Framed feels as if it could have been shot in 1946, 1966, or 2006. The scares work, but are definitely old school. To fit the story into 18 minutes, Consiglio and DiPippo have condensed the scope and compressed the action. It’s clear that Jackie is related to the haunting from the first frame, and she’s the only one who’s haunted. As it turns out, very little detective work is necessary to put the pieces together; they just need to be displayed. It would be easy to classify this as a Cliff Notes version, but that belittles an enjoyable film that still packs a punch.

The Resurrectionist (15 min. Writer/Director: Susan Bell) is an attractive, gothic rendering of the old ghost story. In the mid 1900s, a poor gravedigger and his wife make a deal to supply the local medical college with corpses. It’s a rule of horror films that violating the bodies of the dead produces unpleasant effects; the gravedigger learns this as his long journey through the forest offers up one terror after another.

One of the best ways to dress up a well known story is to, well, play dress up. A change of era does marvels. A few period costumes, antique props, and a cabin in the woods, and everything old seems new again. Sure there’s no surprises on-screen, but I didn’t expect any. What I got was a well filmed, well choreographed, uncluttered fright film that focuses more on beauty than on scares but manages to have it both ways.

While the plot is predictable, I was amazed to learn this was a student film. It looks too professional. A real horse pulling an authentic wagon through a swamp late at night, all lit so that everything can be seen without a suggestion that it isn’t nearly pitch, is not the sort of thing that pops up in student films. Bell lucked out with a superb Alabama location, previously chiseled into an eerie wonderland by Tim Burton for Big Fish. There’s no better way for a low budget filmmaker to stretch a dollar than to latch onto the big boys’ toys.

208 (14 min. Writer/Director: Jimmy Sariya) emphasizes the emotional side of the story over plotting. It’s not a fun ride, but rather a draining one that’s worth the discomfort. It asks you to feel what two suicidal girls are experiencing. That’s nothing I’ve ever wanted to do, but many of the best films ask you to go places you’d rather not. The heavy drama makes it hard to get into 208, but once in, it’s a creepy place to be.

A girl, running out of choices, checks into room 208 in a random motel. Of course she isn’t the first. The room has had hundreds of occupants before her, some sad and lonely. One of those was also a girl on the edge, who died by her own hand, and she’s now reaching out to the latest occupant. 208 is about suffering and loss.

There’s not much dialog and only a few sentences of conversation, which is all it needs. You won’t want to revisit 208, at least not without a substantial break, a few uppers, and a couple of trips to an amusement park, but then you won’t need to. It sticks with you.

Jake Kennedy takes the tale in a gritty, brutal direction with We All Fall Down (14 min. Writer/Director: Jake Kennedy). This is a simplified variant of the traditional ghost story with a Texas Chainsaw mentality. It’s meant to appeal to a generation brought up on Saw, Hostel, and anything that makes your stomach churn.

Four alcohol-addled, early twenty-somethings run down a schoolgirl and figure their best way to avoid jail is to hide the body, mutilated so no one can tell who it belonged to. Five years later, their hiding place is about to be discovered, so Max heads back to move the corpse. Any horror fan will know that can’t turn out well, and it doesn’t, as Amanda, Max’s girlfriend and co-conspirator, quickly learns. She takes off to find Max, leading to occult mayhem and grizzly flashbacks.

We All Fall Down varies from the template by pulling out the mystery and connecting up the protagonists to the haunting from the start. The result is a revenge flick, similar to dozens of slashers. But Kennedy makes up for the linear plot with a cornucopia of repulsive images that will be manna to modern horror aficionados. Where else can you find a young girl’s teeth smashed in with a mallet (and please, don’t answer)? With solid acting, J-horror influences, and effective, frenetic camerawork, We All Fall Down is a statement of where hardcore horror is now.

Para-Normal (16 min. Writer/Director: Lauren Timmons) takes us into postmodern ghostland, with an eye on pop culture—youths, reality TV, and a nod to The Blair Witch Project. This is the world—our world—where everyone has a video camera, and life would be better if no one did. You can almost feel Timmons winking at us, yet she manages to keep the frights in place.

Ben is a guy with that video camera who’s sat through too many episodes of Ghost Hunters. He’s got big plans to be a paranormal researcher. Not clever occupational planning. Ben drags his unimpressed girlfriend to an empty house that he’s sure will be his big break. Also along for the ride, and to document paranormal activity, are his friend, Travis, and Travis’s date. Travis, being wiser than Ben, puts his efforts into getting closer to his girl. Ben only has eyes for unnatural events, which may spell the end of his relationship. Unfortunately for him, he finds what he’s looking for.

Smart, sassy, and with one or two good scares, Para-Normal is the ghost story for a more cynical time, for an audience that’s seen it all many times and wants to know the characters on-screen have as well.

Finally, I end up where I always do whenever I discuss cinematic spirits, at Repossessed (8 min. Director: John Coven Writers: John Coven, Cornell Christianson). A masterpiece of horror, I’ve seen it more than any short that doesn’t contain Bugs Bunny. I have even screened it twice at the DCIS Film Festival, once with the lead actress in attendance.

You’ll have no problem recognizing the plot. A realtor (JoBeth Williams) prepares to show a pleasant little house. The day is bright and warm, and her reality doesn’t involve spooks and specters. Her first potential buyer is a pleasant young woman (Juliet Landau), a bit standoffish perhaps, but an excellent prospect nonetheless. That is, excellent until the woman begins asking about rumors she’d heard, about owners that couldn’t keep the home and who were engulfed in tragedy. Soon, the creaks and bumps can no longer be assigned to the wind, and things start to get much stranger.

Repossessed is a film that works on every level. Williams (a veteran of another ghostly classic, Poltergeist) is an amiable every-woman who sweeps us into the film. Landau (best known as Drusilla on Buffy the Vampire Slayer) is charming, but also exudes something alien, something impossible to pin down. The music is dramatic but never distracting, and each shot carries us to the next. The frights are real as is the emotion. However, what earns Repossessed its place at the top of the indie horror pile is its economy. Coven has managed what I had previously thought impossible: he’s presented the classic ghost story—the one told in The Uninvited in 99 minutes, in The Forgotten One in 100 minutes, and in Poltergeist in 114 minutes—and done it in 8 minutes. Most shorts trim, slice, or wildly hack off large chunks, but Coven keeps it all. The slow buildup, the character development, the frights, they’re all here. Nothing is diluted. It leaves behind the question, what did director John Irvin do with his additional 102 minutes in Ghost Story? What did any of them do?

Ghosts may have been latecomers to the cinematic horror convention, but they’re here to stay. Every year sees more and more celluloid hauntings. In recent years, Asia has been the capital of the ethereal undead. I can’t guess if that trend will continue. I can say that a majority of what will come will look like what has come before, and all of it can be summed up by Repossessed.