Stir of Echoes

Tom (Bacon) finds his mundane life turned upside down by the discovery that he and his young son possess powers beyond the realms of the ordinary human mind. He can see the spirits of the dead, which roam the Earth.

Tom begins to overcome his terror and embarks on a murder hunt - he is determined to find the killer of the girl whose ghost keeps appearing to him. She turns out to be the sister of the family's babysitter who went missing some time ago.

Superficially reminiscent of The Sixth Sense, Tom and his son echo the characters played by Bruce Willis and Hayley Joel Osment with a different resonance. There is more involvement with the occult in this film but the paramount theme of visions creating havoc in an ordinary person's life, is similar.

Without the stunning pay-off, which made The Sixth Sense a classic psychological thriller, the actors have to carry their strong performances right to the finish. Tom's voyage into the supernatural is eerie and convincing.

Kevin Bacon, one of Hollywood's most underrated actors, brings a creepy and engrossing performance to a film which is full of terrifying surprises and horrific conclusions.

Youngster Cope is remarkably confident for his age, but it's Bacon's performance that holds the movie together. His gradual descent from quietly spoken and hard-working family man to virtual recluse - a danger to himself and his loved ones - sustains plausibility throughout.

His haggard, almost deathly appearance creates a harrowing image of his tortured mind.

The cinematography is effective and atmospheric and the visual narrative is interspersed with jumps and jolts to keep the audience on their toes.

Adapted from Richard Matheson's novel; frightening and imaginatively interpreted, David Koepp's film explores the mind beyond the mysterious limits of science. The film dissects the causes of the human mind working as a defence mechanism, burying shocking memories deep within the subconscious.

Ambiguous, subtle, disturbing and chilling, the intellectual thriller Stir of Echoes will not leave you for some time after watching it.