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The Blackwell Ghost: Documentary or Horror Movie with a Great Hook?

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It’s been over a month ago since I first discovered The Blackwell Ghost streaming on Amazon Prime.  Honestly, I had passed it over in the suggestions menu several times, but it was one of those late nights where I wanted one last movie and this one was only an hour or so long.

The first interesting thing about this film is that it is described as a documentary.  In fact, there was no mention of this being a horror film or even found footage in any description I could find.

Now, I’m a paranormal enthusiast and have been an investigator for years, so I was further excited as the film began and the filmmaker in voiceover talked about his experiences making zombie movies in Los Angeles and how he’d decided to try something new.

In short, he wanted to make a documentary about the paranormal, and his interest had grown from a viral video that had made the rounds on YouTube of supposed actual paranormal phenomena caught on CCTV.

Over the next hour, I watched as the amateur documentarian went on his own adventure investigating a home in Pennsylvania.  Supposedly, in the 1940s, the home was owned by James and Ruth Blackwell.

Ruth had a reputation for being a bit strange, so it was no surprise to her neighbors when she was accused of murdering seven children and disposing of their bodies down the well in the basement.

Throughout the film, he never once wavers in his assertion that what he and his wife, Terri, are experiencing is actually real.  Furthermore, he backs up those claims with alleged researched proof of the history of the home.  I have to admit, by the end of the film I wasn’t entirely sure what to believe.  What I knew for sure was that it was a hell of a movie that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Over the next few days, I watched the film five or six more times.  I showed it to local friends and recommended it to others.  Everyone seemed to really enjoy it, but their reactions were the same across the board–they just weren’t sure they could believe what they were watching.

And really, who could blame them?

We live in a post Paranormal Activity world.  In an era filled with technology where the line between reality and illusion seems to blur more and more every day, and while belief in the paranormal is actually growing, there’s a general certainty that we won’t find it on film.

Perhaps it was natural that my reporter’s sense kicked in at this point.  I chatted with our editor-in-chief here at iHorror and decided I needed to dig into the story of The Blackwell Ghost.

I began my search by attempting to discover who the filmmaker was.  He is not listed in the credits; however, he did include pictures of a couple of scenes from one of his zombie films.

I was able to match those scenes to a film called Disaster L.A., a low-budget zombie flick from 2014.  The name of the filmmaker there was Turner Clay, but Clay is a total ghost online.  I found no actual pictures of him and so I could not verify that the man in the film was the man who made the movie.

After hitting a virtual dead end while tracking down information on Turner Clay, I turned my search to James and Ruth Blackwell in Pennsylvania in the 1940s and immediately got a hit on the names.  However, census records show that the only James and Ruth Blackwell in Pennsylvania in the 1940s were a young African American couple.  James and Ruth in the film were not only white, but they were also a much older couple as evidenced by the picture of Ruth that the filmmaker displays in the film.

It was another dead end but I wasn’t ready to give up just yet.

I contacted Dr. Marie Hardin at Penn State University who put me in contact with Jeff Knapp at the Larry and Ellen Foster Communications Library.

Knapp spent a weekend digging into the library’s considerable resources and at the end of his research could find no mention of the murder I described in 1941 or the years surrounding it.

Furthermore, he could not find a James or Ruth Blackwell connected to a murder investigation at all in the time period. Finally, nowhere in the archives were details of Detective Jim Hooper, a name I had pulled from a newspaper article the filmmaker displays in the movie.

With this information in hand, I sent a series of emails to the filmmaker via a third party in hope that he would make some time to talk to me.  As of this writing, none of those emails have been answered.

So, here I am, several weeks on with no definitive answers to my questions.  I have, however, whittled the possibilities down in my mind.

A. The filmmaker came up with as clever a plan for marketing a horror film as I’ve seen since The Blair Witch Project way back in the 1990s.  He filled his film with just the right kind of information to draw the viewer in and foster belief in his audience.  In which case, I say “Bravo, a job well done!”

OR

B. The filmmaker actually made a documentary and in the rarest of cases caught actual evidence on camera.  For whatever reasons, to protect his own identity or the descendants of those mentioned in the film, he decided to change the names and locations of the home and its sordid history.

At this time I personally lean toward my first explanation.  As I said in the beginning, I am a paranormal investigator and have spent a large part of my life pursuing those mysteries.  In other words, to embrace the cliche, I WANT TO BELIEVE!

If you’re out there reading this, Mr. Clay, please reach out.  I’d love to discuss your movie.

In the meantime, fans of the paranormal or horror movies in general, I encourage you to check out the trailer for The Blackwell Ghost below and stream it on Amazon Prime.

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‘Immaculate’ Stars Reveal Which Horror Villains They Would “F, Marry, Kill”

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Sydney Sweeney is just coming off the success of her rom-com Anyone But You, but she’s ditching the love story for a horror story in her latest film Immaculate.

Sweeney is taking Hollywood by storm, portraying everything from a love-lusting teenager in Euphoria to an accidental superhero in Madame Web. Although the latter got a lot of hate among theater-goers, Immaculate is getting the polar opposite.

The film was screened at SXSW this past week and was well-received. It also gained a reputation for being extremely gory. Derek Smith of Slant says the, “final act contains some of the most twisted, gory violence this particular subgenre of horror has seen in years…”

Thankfully curious horror movie fans won’t have to wait long to see for themselves what Smith is talking about as Immaculate will hit theaters across the United States on March, 22.

Bloody Disgusting says that the movie’s distributor NEON, in a bit of marketing smarts, had stars Sydney Sweeney and Simona Tabasco play a game of “F, Marry, Kill” in which all their choices had to be horror movie villains.

It’s an interesting question, and you might be surprised at their answers. So colorful are their responses that YouTube slapped an age-restricted rating on the video.

Immaculate is a religious horror movie that NEON says stars Sweeney, “as Cecilia, an American nun of devout faith, embarking on a new journey in a remote convent in the picturesque Italian countryside. Cecilia’s warm welcome quickly devolves into a nightmare as it becomes clear her new home harbors a sinister secret and unspeakable horrors.”

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Michael Keaton Raves About “Beetlejuice” Sequel: A Beautiful and Emotional Return to the Netherworld

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After more than three decades since the original “Beetlejuice” film took audiences by storm with its unique blend of comedy, horror, and whimsy, Michael Keaton has given fans a reason to eagerly anticipate the sequel. In a recent interview, Keaton shared his thoughts on an early cut of the upcoming “Beetlejuice” sequel, and his words have only added to the growing excitement surrounding the film’s release.

Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice

Keaton, reprising his iconic role as the mischievous and eccentric ghost, Beetlejuice, described the sequel as “beautiful”, a term that encapsulates not only the visual aspects of the film but its emotional depth as well. “It is really good. And beautiful. Beautiful, you know, physically. You know what I mean? The other one was so fun and exciting visually. It’s all that, but really kind of beautiful and interestingly emotional here and there. I wasn’t ready for that, you know. Yeah, it’s great,” Keaton remarked during his appearance on The Jess Cagle Show.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

Keaton’s praise did not stop at the film’s visual and emotional appeal. He also lauded the performances of both returning and new cast members, signaling a dynamic ensemble that is sure to please fans. “It’s great and the cast, I mean, Catherine [O’Hara], if you thought she was funny last time, double it. She’s so funny and Justin Theroux is like, I mean, come on,” Keaton enthused. O’Hara returns as Delia Deetz, while Theroux joins the cast in a yet-to-be-disclosed role. The sequel also introduces Jenna Ortega as Lydia’s daughter, Monica Bellucci as Beetlejuice’s wife, and Willem Dafoe as a dead B movie actor, adding new layers to the beloved universe.

“It’s just so fun and I’ve seen it now, I’m gonna see it again after a couple little tweaks in the editing room and I confidently say this thing is great,” Keaton shared. The journey from the original “Beetlejuice” to its sequel has been a long one, but if Keaton’s early rave is anything to go by, it will have been worth the wait. Showtime for the sequel is set for September 6th.

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‘The Unknown’ From Willy Wonka Event is Getting a Horror Movie

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Not since the Fyre Festival has an event been so lambasted online as Glasgow, Scotland’s Willy Wonka Experience. In case you haven’t heard about it, it was a children’s spectacular that celebrated Roald Dahl’s offbeat chocolatier by taking families through a themed space that felt like his magical factory. Only, thanks to cellphone cameras and social testimony, it was actually a sparsely decorated warehouse filled with flimsy set designs that looked like they were bought on Temu.

The famous disgruntled Oompa Loompa is now a meme and several hired actors have spoken out about the inelegant party. But one character seems to have come out on top, The Unknown, the mirror-masked emotionless villain who appears from behind a mirror, terrifying younger attendees. The actor who played Wonka, at the event, Paul Conell, recites his script and gives some backstory to this frightening entity.

“The bit that got me was where I had to say, ‘There is a man we don’t know his name. We know him as the Unknown. This Unknown is an evil chocolate maker who lives in the walls,'” Conell told Business Insider. “It was terrifying for the kids. Is he an evil man who makes chocolate or is the chocolate itself evil?”

Despite the sour affair, something sweet may come out of it. Bloody Disgusting has reported that a horror movie is being made based on The Unknown and may get a release as early as this year.

The horror publication quotes Kaledonia Pictures: “The film, gearing up for production and a late 2024 release, follows a renowned illustrator and his wife who are haunted by the tragic death of their son, Charlie. Desperate to escape their grief, the couple leave the world behind for the remote Scottish Highlands – where an unknowable evil awaits them.”

@katsukiluvrr evil chicolate maker who lives in the walls from willies chocolate experience in glasgow x #glasgow #willywonka #wonkaglasgow #scottish #wonka #theunknown #fyp #trending #foryou ♬ its the unknown – mol💌

They add, “We are excited to begin production and look forward to sharing more with you as soon as possible. We are actually only a few miles from the event, so it is quite surreal to see Glasgow all over social media, worldwide.”

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