The October Film Haunt by Michael Wehunt
Analog dread gets an upgrade in the age of social media.
An obscure underground horror movie called “Proof of Demons” ruined Jorie’s life.
The film — only about half the length of a typical feature film — was directed by a mysterious director who seemingly only ever created this one film. A horror film. The sort of video nasty that once might have circulated on bootleg VHS tapes back in the day or be found today only in very niche corners of the internet.
For most of its runtime, “Proof of Demons” played like conventional oblivion-core horror… Except that it was punctuated by three static shots, each lasting exactly six-minutes, in which some crazy shit happens.
A monster emerges from the forest: the pine arch creature.
The film garnered a cult following and a creepypasta lore coalesced around it; that it is literal proof that demons exist, that the pine arch creature is real, that the three six-minute shots were actually some form of transfiguration ritual.
It was the perfect film to capture the imagination of Jorie and her friends who wrote the October Film Haunt blog. As they’d done for many films previously, they tracked down the shoot location and camped out overnight where, according to Jorie’s blog post, they encountered the pine arch creature for themselves!
Except it’s all bullshit. Jorie was just lying for clicks.
Good news: the October Film Haunt squad got a lot of attention regardless.
Bad news: a kid indirectly died as a result of Jorie’s misleading dispatch.
A decade later, Jorie is more or less in hiding as she still struggles to forgive herself for all the bad things she was responsible for in her youth. But it becomes apparent that someone hates her even more than she hates herself.
A videotape turns up at her house that seems to continue the “Proof of Demons” saga. Soon, other clips surface online and it seems a sequel is in production.
But this time, Jorie herself is an unwilling participant.
Someone is filming Jorie and her child without her knowledge or consent. Violent strangers start stalking her, breaking into her house, and doing everything they can to drive her out of her mind in terror.
The October Film Haunt offers a delicious pitch to horror fans and Wehunt throws everything but the kitchen sink at this novel: a cursed film, shadow monsters, slashers, demonic possession — all of these and more are present or at least alluded to across the pages of this book.
Does it all work?
Mostly. There is a lot going on here; The October Film Haunt takes you on quite a rollercoaster through the expansive horror genre. There are some legitimately spooky moments, and the book pulls off a juggling act in that it is both atmospheric, suspenseful, and unrepentantly weird. There is something for everyone to a degree.
Although Jori is the main protagonist of the story, her chapters are interspersed with various interludes focused on other characters including (among others) an actor who had a bit part in the original “Proof of Demons” movie and an elderly man recently diagnosed with cancer who seemingly has a deep-seated connection with whatever is going on, despite only just hearing of the movie for the first time.
The October Film Haunt eventually weaves all these different story strands together so that it does, for the most part, make sense. That’s not to say things don’t get ridiculously confusing at points (they do), but it always seems like things are at least making sense to the characters, which means the reader is free to just roll with it.
It’s certainly an ambitious book, and it is at times considerably messy. But it’s clear that it’s born out of a deep and genuine love for horror fiction, and as such this is a love letter as much to outrageous cinema as it is to the fans that obsess over it — and who are willing to be forgiving when something they enjoy isn’t entirely perfect.