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The year's second scariest film (after The Blair Witch Project) comes from an unlikely source – writer/director David Koepp (The Trigger Effect), who adapted the script from Richard Matheson's book (he also wrote the novel What Dreams May Come). Echoes will unfortunately open after the similar but big-budgeted Bruce Willis flick The Sixth Sense (due 8/6), but is still one of the creepiest films to be released since Se7en.
Echoes opens with a little boy named Jake staring into the camera while sitting in the tub. He's answering questions that nobody appears to be asking. Is it an imaginary friend? His parents seem to think so, but Jake is really conversing with the spirit of a missing local girl named Samantha Kozak.
Kevin Bacon (Wild Things) plays Tom Witzky, Jake's blue-collar working father that has spent his entire life within a six-block radius of one Chicago neighborhood. He's disappointed with his boring life and dead-end job. His hippie sister-in-law Lisa (Illeana Douglas, Grace of my Heart) talks a disbelieving Tom into undergoing hypnosis at a party. He only sees a second or two of seemingly unrelated and fragmented flashes, but when Tom comes to, he's been told that he was out for several minutes. To make matters worse, Lisa also plants a suggestion into Tom's subconscious. Not the kind that will make him cluck like a chicken when somebody says the word `omelette,' but rather an innocent appeal to be a bit more open-minded.
Before he went under, Tom crowed `C'mon – what's the worst that could happen?' Well, the worst does happen - amateur hypnotist Lisa accidentally opened the door to his mind instead of making him open-minded. What does that mean? Just that Tom slowly is able to see and hear the same things as his son. He catches more glimpses of the spooky images that he saw while under hypnosis, and even catches a glimpse or two of Samantha. He also drinks a lot of orange juice and begins to unwind mentally, putting a strain on his wife Maggie (Kathryn Erbe, Dream with the Fishes).
When Lisa puts Tom under a second time in an attempt to close the Pandora's box, he instead gets a one-word message from beyond: `Dig.' What follows is very reminiscent of the slow descent into madness previously seen in The Amityville Horror and The Shining. In fact, you can't help but think of Amityville's George Lutz (James Brolin) digging up his basement while watching Bacon do the same thing. And maybe you'll be reminded of Bacon's Flatliners. The story is derivative of both films (and many others), but it's still original enough to raise the hair on your arms on several occasions.
The story is fairly predictable (I called it about 40 minutes into the film) but seems oddly short. It's almost like a lot was carved out of the final cut – Tom's rock band, Jake's baby monitor, Maggie's pregnancy and a cop named Neil all seemed destined to have more screen time, but were curiously skipped over after careful introductions. But the film is worth the price of admission just for Bacon and the young son's eerie performances. (1:35 – R for brief nudity, sexual content, adult language and violence)
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