Stir of Echoes had the misfortune of coming out a month after The Sixth Sense. No one could have expected The Sixth Sense to change the game for ghost stories, so an old school one was doomed. Fortunately, it’s still a solid entry in the genre with effective setup and performances by Kevin Bacon, Katherine Erbe, Jennifer Morrison and young Zachary David Cope.
Horror is all about darkness so Stir of Echoes looks great in 4K with the range available. The hypnosis scene is your first hint of how deep the movie’s darkness can go. His vision of the movie theater blackening drives it home, with a white screen emitting in the pure void.
Everything in this movie looks ominous, from the Chicago neighborhood under the night sky to their house at night. Erbe walks down a dark alley that would look terrifying in any movie let alone this one.
The sound design contributes to the stir of echoes too. You’ll hear the haunting whispers behind you, as well as rain and thunder in the climax.
Back in the golden age of DVD there were already a ton of extras, but Lionsgate adds two new ones. David Koepp’s interview includes Bacon, Erbe and Morrison’s screen tests. Bacon’s comes from the digging scene and he gets there just for the audition.
Koepp also talks about what he learned from Spielberg and De Palma, the practical camera tricks he employed and how he discovered and decided to adapt Richard Matheson’s novel.
An interview with cinematographer Fred Murphy goes into the corrections made for the 4K transfer. They are disciplined not to change it too drastically but it is impressive what they are able to improve in this format.