Stir of Echoes (1999)

Absorbing supernatural movie!
Tom Witzky (Kevin Bacon) who's just your basic working father in Chicago with a wife named Maggie(Kathryn Erbe) and a son named Jake (Zachery David). One night, Maggie's sister Lisa (Illena Douglas) believes in psychic communication as she challenges him to be hypnotized by her. It unfortunately gave some side effects to him as he has bizarre visions of violence and sees the spirit of a dead woman that died some time ago in the neighborhood yet he also sees her spirit. His son also has a similar power but only calm to spirits, Tom must find clues of the dead woman so he can get rid of his unwanted powers and find a way to let her spirit rest.

Intriguing and smart psychological supernatural horror thriller based on a novel by Richard Matheson is one of the most overlooked horror movies of all time. It was originally made in 1998 then released later in September 1999 on the month after the successful similar movie "The Sixth Sense", some folks and critics have compared to the other movie while some have declaired this to be the better of the two. Sure "The Sixth Sense" was an excellent movie in it's own right but this is a more involving and scary thrill-ride as it's truly the best horror movie of 1999 and a must see.

This Special Edition DVD contains very good extras like audio commentary, Deleted scenes, Screen test clips, Behind The Scenes/Final Shot Comparisons, Featurettes and Music video.

Also recommended: "Poltergeist", "The Others", "Silent Hill", "Final Destination Trilogy", "Saw II", "The Tenent", "Sixth Sense", "Making Contact (a.k.a. Joey)", "The Haunting (1963)", "The Shining", "Legend of HellHouse" and "The Ring (Japanese and American)".

Great movie
I enjoy watching Kevin Bacon. This is one I watch over and over. I would recommend it to anyone who likes a good spooky movie.

Finding that "open door"
Samuel Taylor Coleridge once described it as a "willing suspension of disbelief." If you read a book or see a movie that stretches the boundaries of reality, or so you believe, but the art compels you to enter into its dimension and you do so, you have willingly suspended your disbelief.

Are there ghosts? If so, can they visit their needs upon us? Can they grab our attention and demand justice? Is it possible for hypnosis to "open doors to the impossible?" Director David Koepp and his convincing cast make the viewer want to suspend disbelief and join them in this 94-minute excursion into the world beyond death.

As usual, Kevin Bacon, one of our best actors, delivers a convincing performance as Tom, the ultimate skeptic. His apology to Maggie for his ordinariness seems out of place at the time, but it foreshadows the unlikely event to follow: his dip into otherworldliness. Another seemingly incongruous scene places Jake (Zachary David Cope) and Maggie (Kathryn Erbe) at a cemetery, where Jake, by seeming happenstance, meets Neil, another open-door traveler into the other world. It is Neil's explanation that helps Maggie grasp the intensity of Tom's visions, but not understand them.

A spare economy of scenes makes each one pertinent to plot development, a sort of one-thing-leads-to-another-to-another-and so on. Maggie's visit to Neil causes her to put a knife in her purse. Her grandmother dies, removing Jake from his bed of feathers. Jake reminds his mother to take her purse, which, of course, puts the knife at hand for the ending. None of this is spoiler material. If you read this beforehand, it will mean nothing except a clicking into place as you view. Afterward, you will say, Aha!

Crime will out, especially when the echoes of the dead, once living, find an "open door" to stir through and demand help. Once satisfied, the dead can move on to wherever they go, calmly and peacefully. The door, however, remains ajar. And those voices, those echoes of the dead, know where those doors are.