Well this film certainly didn’t help make sleep paralysis look any less horrifying. In fact the scare factor for the very common condition that can affect pretty much anyone of any age. Sleep paralysis is what happens when you’re about to go to sleep or you’re waking up and you simply cannot move no matter how you try. You might know just what’s going on around you and be able to hear and see everything, but moving is simply out of the question. This film however takes it to another level since Sara is being visited in her dream by an apparition that is many ways an amalgam of those objects and events that she’s just witnessed.
The game show host, the answer to the questions, a painting we see on her wall, all of this conspires to make a very frightening daydream that she cannot seem to wake from and cannot break apart since she can’t seem to move. That alone would be enough to terrify anyone, but the strange creature that crawls out of her chimney like some demented, demonic apparition is simply disgusting in ways that can’t be fully described. She can’t move as it approaches, clawing its way towards her in the strange, broken fashion of Samara from The Ring, while the game show host on the TV merely watches and smiles. The gesture is almost like the predatory grin of a wolf watching their prey as the pack closes in.
As the thing gets closer, and closer, it finally perches on the couch. But it doesn’t stop there. Sara still can’t move, but she can watch it come closer as it crawls over her on the couch, keeping its hands and feet to either side of her. The fact that it’s humanoid does nothing to lessen the fear or make her believe that it’s anything other than a dangerous being perhaps ready to savage her at any moment. If she knows enough to identify The Ring then she’s probably well aware that this thing will soon enough be doing something rather unpleasant to her. And yet for a few moments it simply rests where it is, the darkness within its impossibly deep cowl keeping its face concealed and its true nature hidden away.
Then the eyes of the game show host turn black as the smile continues to shine, promising nothing more and nothing less than mayhem and carnage as the creature rears its head forth. It is a human face, but as its mouth opens Sara can see the twin rows of razor-sharp fangs that jut forth, threatening to savage her at any moment as it screams long and loud at her, the sound seeming to deafen her for a moment as the thing continues. And then, just as though it couldn’t get any better, something with long, spindly legs begins to emerge from the things mouth, pushing forward as though ready to born from the jaws of the nightmare.
And then she wakes up. There is no presence in her room, the chimney is devoid of life, and her home is as it was. But the terror is still there.
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