So much average

Best movie of this year hands down!

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Good movie, but Hollywood pulled a fast on on us. What other movie reminds us of a good movie that is like this that came out in the last 5 yrs. Hmmm Odd Thomas, yep!!!!! Well to bad the kids name is Jake. Would have been neat to have his name Thomas. Hahaha

Saturday night Horror movie - Stir of Echoes with a good horror feel and interesting screenplay with the edge of the feel to know what is going to happen at next!

When I review a movie I don't go into plot; you can read that anywhere. I'm a screenwriter myself so I tend to write about idiosyncratic things that you'd not look for, but your mind sees. The film has a fresh story, is beautifully lit, artistically shot, and is worth the watch. In the trivia section, one of the contributors has it exactly correct: what they would do is slow the film speed down as much as possible and have the actress walk as normally as she can. Then they speed the film up to regular speed and all the little mannerisms come out in an eerie sort of ghostly ethereal way. It's not used much - Hitchcock would have loved this technique. Lots of fortuitous things happen, like when Bacon kicks a bucket through a window which was accidental but Bacon had the presence of mind to stay in character thus the shot made the movie. The direction was better than average the acting better than average. Ileana Douglas is always good Bacon is usually good or Erbe is underrated and too seldom cast so you had the makings already of a film that you knew had potential. Add the weird twist and Jennifer Morrison, AKA Doctor Cameron from the show "House", and you have a movie that is great to watch on a rainy Sunday afternoon. I recommend it.

This movie is guaranteed to freak you out. The visual effects, although low tech, are extremely well done and provide a very eerie look into the world of the paranormal. One of the things that caught my attention was that this story was originally penned by Richard Matheson as a book. He has a boatload of credits to his name both as a book and short story author as well as the dozens of film and TV scripts he's written. The plot is just OK but nothing spectacular here, and very far from the novel spirit. Elements that are introduced throughout the film are tided together quite nicely in the end. The acting is decent, with Kevin Bacon giving the best performance in his major role part in this movie. He really makes you believe in his character, which is one of the elements that makes this movie work so well. The acting, particularly, struck me as being better, but Katheryn Erbe, as Kevin's wife, really jumped out. They paired well. The other actors do a good job as well. Illeana Douglas' character might have been a bit 'too' but that's a minor quibble.The movie sags after its strong start and features a slew of horror movie clichés seances, visions, and sudden loud noises. Over time, I saw how the stories of the other secondary characters did and didn't intersect when it was about to come to a head. The special features include a nice featuring, where the actors, director and writer of the film-inspiring novel give their takes on this project which never fails to send shivers up the spine.Overall rating: 7 out of 10.