Maybe mischievous spirits do haunt this Jewish scroll cabinet, or maybe it's just another Web-spawned legend run wild.
July 25, 2004|Leslie Gornstein | Special to The Times
A small wooden cabinet went up for auction on EBay. Inside were two locks of hair, one granite slab, one dried rosebud, one goblet, two wheat pennies, one candlestick and, allegedly, one "dibbuk," a kind of spirit popular in Yiddish folklore.
The seller, a Missouri college student named Iosif Nietzke, described the container as a "haunted Jewish wine cabinet box" that had plagued several owners with rotten luck and a spate of bizarre paranormal stunts.
"We have definitely seen a tidal wave of 'bad luck,' " the seller wrote on EBay in the first week of February. "Most disturbingly, last Tuesday, my hair began to fall out. I'm in my early 20s and I just got a clean blood test back from the doctor's...."
Within days, the box's opening bid of $1 jumped to $50; that value soon quadrupled. On Feb. 9, the box sold for $280 to a university museum curator named Jason Haxton.
In the months after, the hype surrounding the wooden box has mushroomed. The Forward, a 107-year-old Jewish newspaper on the East Coast, ran a story about the box's sale and supposed otherworldly powers. Since then, the EBay auction page has logged more than 140,000 hits.
At least five authors, one screenwriter and a documentary crew have sought up-close access, says Haxton, a 46-year-old father of two who also lives in Missouri. Rabbis, Orthodox Jews and Hebrew intellectuals have contacted Haxton, offering to crack the box's mysteries.
Haxton says he's had to unlist his home number, change his e-mail address and erect a website,
www.dibbukbox.com, just to field inquiries. He agreed to be interviewed only if he could add this request: Please, please, box fans, leave him alone.
The strange case of the bogey in a box is threatening to become an urban legend as big as any ghostly hitchhiker, fried rat or stolen body part. In Chicago, Bull basketball fans have paused their online arguments over salary caps to post theories on what's in the box. Ditto with newsgroups usually dedicated to Subaru ownership or NASCAR tickets. In Long Island, a group of particularly dedicated ghost hunters has founded a Yahoo chat group dedicated solely to the box.
All the while, dozens of Web surfers have e-mailed Haxton through his website, complaining of strange headaches, nightmares and other plagues.
"One person pleaded with me to get all images of the box off the Internet because they would provide an electronic portal for the spirit into every computer that visited the site," he says.
Most often, discussions of dybbuks (as it is more commonly spelled) are accompanied by plenty of snorting skepticism -- "I think I'm going to put my haunted Game Cube on EBay," one Texan recently posted -- but the number of those fascinated with the little wooden box continues to climb.
The reason, experts say, is tied to a witch's brew of trends and developments unique to the new millennium: A booming blog culture; a growing interest in Jewish mysticism, particularly cabala; and high-speed Internet connections that allow photos to be downloaded onto countless home computers.
Dybbuks have haunted Yiddish folk tales since the dawn of Judaism's mystical movement in the latter half of the 16th century. "Dybbuk" literally means "an attachment, a cleaving to something"; a dybbuk is thought to be the spirit of a person who, instead of drifting into the next realm, sticks around and enters the bodies of living people.
"It's essentially a kook subject," muses Rabbi Eli Schochet, a professor of rabbinic thought at L.A.'s Academy for Jewish Religion, which trains rabbis and cantors. "But I could never say that it's impossible because, obviously, there's precedent for these things that are recorded in different religious traditions, including my own."
The EBay auction page (still viewable on Haxton's website) claims to document experiences from two previous owners, told in the first person and pasted back to back in the item's description space.
The tale, according to the site, began in fall 2001, when Oregon antiques collector and small-business owner Kevin Mannis discovered the box -- smaller than a case of beer, decorated with two metal plates in the shape of grape clusters -- at a neighborhood estate sale. (Mannis later told The Times he bought the box in 2000, but so much bad fortune befell him in that first year that he didn't want to tell potential buyers about it.)
Mannis said the estate sale's host told him that the box had belonged to her 103-year-old grandmother, who had dubbed the cabinet a "dybbuk box" and warned her kids ... never to open it.
Heedless of this spooky back story, Mannis bought the box and put it in the basement of his antiques business. A half-hour after the box arrived, the creepiness, as he describes it, began: While Mannis ran a few errands, a mysterious force apparently went berserk in his shop, cursing and smashing light bulbs and scaring a store clerk.
"When I got back to the shop, I went to investigate," Mannis says from his Oregon home. "I remember heading toward the back and walking into what I can only describe as a wall of scent. It smelled like jasmine flowers. You could take one more step and not smell a thing, and take a step backward and be surrounded by it again."
Later, he says, when he gave the box to his mother as a gift, she suffered a stroke that temporarily left her unable to speak. She penned the tersely scrawled admonishment "hate gift" and Mannis has not discussed the object with her since, he says. The FBI then raided Mannis' shop, he says, hauling out loads of electronic equipment. He got his stuff back but says he never got an explanation for the raid. Add to his list of woes that he lost his shop lease and was a victim of identity theft.
"All of this stuff has an explanation that doesn't necessarily point to this box," Mannis muses. "But when you take everything together, it becomes such a weird coincidence."
The 'curse' changes hands
BY June 2003, Mannis had had enough and posted the box on EBay. The high bidder was Nietzke, who, for $140, got the box, contents and -- presumably -- its ectoplasmic squatter. (Repeated attempts to reach Nietzke have been unsuccessful.)
Nietzke's alleged experiences, which are also posted on EBay -- included strange odors in his house, a bug infestation, malfunctioning electronic devices and "sort of like large, vertical, dark blurs in my peripheral vision."
Haxton, the college museum director who collects religious paraphernalia, says by phone that he first heard about the box last year through a student employee at his museum -- who is also Nietzke's roommate.
When Nietzke posted the box for sale, Haxton went for it. The day after it arrived in his office, Haxton says, "I woke up with my right eye looking like it had been poked." Other afflictions arrived, including fatigue, a metallic taste in his mouth and constant nasal congestion and a cough. Around the house, Haxton says he occasionally smells the signature odors of cat urine and flowers.
Haxton has been aided by Rebecca Edery, an Orthodox Jewish bookkeeper who lives in Brooklyn and whose father studied cabala. It was Edery who helped uncover the purpose of the box. "The two doors on the outside open up just like the Holy Closet," or Aron HaKodesh, a receptacle for Torah scrolls, Edery says. "And I saw round, metal hoops on the inside of the doors that would hold scrolls. This particular size is used when going to comfort the family of the deceased."
Edery says she is convinced the box was sacred and had been intentionally stuffed with some sort of spirit. "This was done deliberately, for a specific purpose." She believes that to put an end to the misfortunes, the box needs a formal Jewish burial involving a 10-man minyan, or prayer group.
For his part, Haxton says he wants to follow the box back to its origins. Then, he says, he might create a replica and bury the original. "To me this is a historical puzzle," he says. "It came from somewhere. It was made for a reason. What is it and why is it?"
Room for doubt on either side
Researchers and religious scholars say that, sure, the box contains items that could have served as fetishes or tokens to a family, Jewish or otherwise. Pennies and locks of hair fall under the common fetish territory, says Bill Ellis, a fetish researcher and American studies professor at Penn State University.
"It was not uncommon for people to hunt through their change and, when they found the birth date of a child, to put that aside as a life token of the child," Ellis says. "You also have two locks of hair. That is a very common tradition, especially for preserving a keepsake of a dead family member. These things would incorporate a memory or some part of a life spirit."
But the tale also contains a parade of red flags that point to a possible hoax.
For one thing, Schochet points out that most dybbuk tales have the ghost coming back to convey some sort of message, but "there is nothing to explain why this particular box is inhabited."
Elliott Oring, an anthropology professor and folklore specialist at Cal State L.A., also has his doubts. "Go through [the story and] you will see areas that seem to require suspending critical functions. There is too much piling on of incidents.... Why wasn't it simply disposed of?"
So if there's no proof a dybbuk exists, why is the box so fascinating?
"We embrace such stories because they tap into our own fears and prejudices," says Allan S. Mott, author of "Urban Legends: Strange Stories Behind Modern Myths."
"The dybbuk story taps into our belief that out in the world there is a supernatural evil that will attack anyone regardless of how good they are. They allow people to make some sense of a chaotic world."
The story also benefits from the credibility lent to it by a mainstream site such as EBay, says Jan Harold Brunvand, author of the coming "Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid: The Book of Scary Urban Legends."
But Brunvand sees a difference in the tale. "The length and detail of the story is unlike most urban legends," he says, "as is the supernatural angle and the first-person narrative. So I would not classify it as a 'normal' urban legend."
Perhaps that leaves open a small window of credibility. After all, who doesn't like a good ghost story?
"Of course, we realize we could most probably be dealing here with a very elaborate hoax," notes the Rev. Jim Willis, an Arizona minister and author of "The Religion Book: Places, Prophets, Saints and Seers." "I have to say that because I do have my academic reputation to uphold." But, he adds, "if you leave it at that, it takes all the fun away."
As his words trail away, a huge picture in his office falls from the wall and crashes to the floor.
"This is weird," Willis says. "Have I just become a part of an urban legend?"
现在的美式恐怖片基本都这样了,和阴儿房 万能钥匙 坠入地狱 一样,好人不能当,不然结局在完美帮忙的你自己也会死,不过我很喜欢这类型的片子,感觉气氛好,有意思,不至于是大烂片。。
人物设计:离异家庭,一个以上小女儿判给母亲,母亲徐娘半年,风韵犹存,女儿尚未发育,但眼大脸尖,肤色苍白,有一头海藻般的长发。父亲身材魁梧,毛发浓密,性格霸气,粗中有细。小三乘虚而入,使得感情刚破裂又藕断丝连的原配夫妻一时间难以重圆。
室内环境:独立别墅,室内设计走简洁路线,人手一个房间,拥有宽敞舒适卫生间,洗脸池上方配置镜柜
人物关系背景:夫妻二人离异,其中一人不甘寂寞耍了新朋友,另一个余情未了,有破镜重圆的念头,但看见前夫(妻)带着新欢秀恩爱,心头酸溜溜。小三为了爱情对拖油瓶还算比较客气。
必备镜头:1、女孩卧室窗户特写,风送窗帘,窗外树影婆娑,同时诡异音乐渐起,镜头再切回到床上熟睡女孩的脸蛋,一阵风就将她惊醒,从女孩脸部特写足以看出,她从小就是个美人胚子。
2、镜柜特写,明亮的卫生间里,给主角来个背面特写,只见她穿着小吊带和三角裤,身材婀娜,皮肤白皙,露出的半截屁股圆润紧实,令人遐想无限。再将镜头切到正面,女主角打开镜柜取物,关上镜柜一瞬间时立刻跟上镜面特写,狰狞鬼魂面孔一瞬即逝,这个镜头只有观众看见,女主角低头忙活了。
3、浴池特写,水龙头里白色水柱汩汩流下,女主角惬意地躺在浴缸里,要害部位都隐藏在白色泡沫中,一双修长的大腿从水面露出,更增幼滑,乳沟随女主角幅度较小的动作若隐若现。镜头围绕女主角推进至少三分钟,让人很想把她从水池中揪出来全面欣赏。正在观众心痒时水停了,女主角坐起来摆弄水龙头,忽然间一股黑水喷射而出,女主角顿时花容失色,再一定神,发现只是眼花,在这个过程中,女主角圆锥形的完美乳房不经意数次曝光,虽不至于当场开撸也让人心中激荡。
4、被附身女孩特写:容颜枯槁,下眼睑青黑,头发干涩,乱的好像多日未梳,动作难度系数由翻白眼逐渐升级,使用意念移动屋内任意一件家具,头部可以360°自由旋转,四肢向身后折去,猛烈吸附到墙上、天花板上以及附近桌子上,大半被头发遮住的脸上只有一对阴森的招子,同时配以尖锐且猥琐的笑声。
5、驱魔神父特写:手持圣经,额头上汗水涔涔而下,不断的重复:in the name of Jesus Christ ,I command you!一遍没用,两遍没用,三遍才开始让被五花大绑的女孩身体开始大幅度扭动身体,再也不萌的脸蛋此刻是哥特式妆容,并且通过后期处理显得五官错位、扭曲,达到震慑人心的效果。辅以下流英语或咒骂或挑逗神父,不时间杂拉丁语、克林贡语等小语种。
人物表现:小三眼见烂摊子难以收拾,当即开溜,没有小三的那一方趁机上位,让对方深深感受到,世上只有孩子亲爹(妈)好的道理,一家子众志成城抗魔救女,在以视觉刺激人的同时,不忘弘扬社会公德、家庭美德。
人物结局:为了拯救孩子,男方诚邀魔鬼上身,还没来得及与刚刚和好的前妻温存,就跳出二楼窗户与之同归于尽,留下妻儿看着只留下玻璃茬的窗户抱头痛哭。
剧情非常老套:一对刚离婚夫妇有两个可爱的女儿,女孩们定期跟父亲团聚过周末,偶然中妹妹得到一个古怪的盒子,开始举止异常,原来盒子里封着恶灵,她被附身了;父亲展开调查,发现盒子来源于犹太教的一支,就去请牧师驱魔,费尽一番力气,一家人团聚如初(不过驱魔牧师挂了)。
是不是很老套哇?各种过时的情节都包括了:感情不合的夫妻、天真萝莉、恶灵附身、解惑的教授,连驱魔都是"呼唤恶魔名字"这种喜闻乐见的形式。请问,大周末的我花75块钱看这部电影的意义何在?thats just fxxking boring. (即便如此,我还是决定不回家睡了,囧rz~)
编剧及导演都十分糊弄事儿,虽然盒子里的恶魔隶属波兰的某支犹太教,可是没看出任何新意。
(以下文字充分显示出撸主对其他民族认知的局限性,请大家当做反面教材 ↓↓↓)
【而且非常可笑的是,爸爸按照地址去类似小波兰的地方找牧师时,当地人的造型非常令人无语--男人大衣礼帽,女人头巾包头,恍如二战时期,这里充分显示出老美对其他民族认知的局限性:穿个旗袍就是东方、男人裹个头巾就是穆斯林、女人包住头发就是东欧。】
哦,还有:
演妈妈的女人好老,得有50+了吧?整个一瘪嘴老太太,还特喜欢穿露锁骨的衣服。长的老不是你的错,出来晃悠吓人就不对了。
姐姐很漂亮!!仿佛看到了teenage的linsay lohan!!!
有人吐槽“核磁共振竟然照出了鬼脸!”其实这里的恐怖效果还不错,颇有点富江的意味。不过,鬼头是挤在胸腔的位置,鬼手又能从妹妹的喉咙里伸出来。。这。。科学吗。。囧rz!(导演:恐怖片你跟我提科学,诚心踢馆吧?!!阿西吧——)诶呀算了,撸主实在孤陋寡闻,就不露怯了,光速撸走~~~~
如果我是编剧:
1、最后驱魔"成功",因为恶魔从妹妹转移到了姐姐身上,没人发现,最后镜头是姐姐诡异的笑容(是的,依旧很老套。。)
2、母亲的男友的真正目标是这姐妹俩(喂。。这是恐怖片不是伦理片好吗。。)
狮门的这部作品表现平平,不过是根据真实故事改编倒确实增添了不少惊悚色彩。最后的结局很出色。
很一般,大人演员太让人出戏了,尤其是剧中的父亲,和他扮演的角色似乎完全不能融合,太脱离感了。PS:同为澳洲新生代女演员,又同为装B派演技代表,我觉得艾伦佩吉还不如卡莉斯
节奏还真不错,还以为又是部普通的流水线驱魔电影,但片子胜在男主角对女儿和家人的爱。
操,你那么帅,那么有型,为什么非要接这么一个大烂片!非要打自己脸吗?
平淡到连一惊一乍都没有了
真的有够刺激!可惜最后的驱魔成功得有些太过简单,被附身的人大团圆平安... 有些不过瘾..
故事很老套,情节也够老,但是真心喜欢这片子的节奏,没有多余,非常紧凑的讲完了一个故事,值得表扬的一点!
家庭类恐怖片需要兼顾人物塑造家庭温情和恐怖元素的平衡,可惜导演顾前者而失后者,对于宗教类恶灵附身题材的发挥过度保守,即便小演员卖力的毁容表演和个别闪光点(如CT显影恶魔之脸那幕)也无济于事。★★☆
二手的东西的确危险,谁也不知道原来的主人施了什么魔法。买二手货要三思。有点儿《驱魔人》的意思,不过是犹太版的冤魂。我都想到了,拿了盒子的犹太男人必死无疑。怎么样!这两姑娘可都真水灵啊!还是自己亲爸吧,其他都白扯!
一些场景拍的很漂亮,但由于过分简单的设定和情节,正是因为这样的场景拍的漂亮用心不禁让人有“有必要这么大费周折吗”的疑问……而且所谓的基于真实改编,我好奇真实指哪部分?我觉得这样的twisted会比较有意思:一个恶灵从嘴里爬出来之后,爬出更多的恶灵……我们可以说一只蛾就是一个恶灵啊。
前半部分都很好,后面越演越白开水,加上我很讨厌男主演的戏,属于那种不管剧本多好,有他就心烦的那种,看的时候好多镜头演着演着突然就黑屏结束了,感觉跟没有剪辑好一样,演的半拉半产的,好多事情就一扫而过了,最后起码你让个小孩再把那盒子捡起来啊,就放马路上就完事了???别出续集,垃圾!!
这是一部根据真实事件改编的恐怖电影,所以有了更多的吸引力,但是,真实太普通了,没有什么惊喜,气氛渲染中规中矩,除了剧情还算合理,家长还算不靠谱以外,真的没有意外啊,其实有个好噱头可以拍更好的
好一般...虽然成片确实和预告片差不多,但是这种小成本的恐怖灵异电影的铺垫基本都摆脱不了闷到爆的下场,好久没看到《坠入地狱》这么二逼又欢乐的片子了。话说最近恐怖片不太给力啊...不知道万圣节档期还有什么好料...
哎呦这个值得纪念。。。我在UK看的第一场电影,也没有人人影视字幕我也都看懂了,看来不能太依靠字幕啊!!卖票还被忽悠加入了Club, 那个奶奶特别热情的给我们介绍了一堆怎么好怎么好,但是我基本上木有听懂,1.99磅也不贵就办了,自己慢慢研究吧╮(╯▽╰)╭
补刷!低成本老套传统的驱魔片,老东西藏着恶魔,附身梗。这次更胜在角色塑造上,爸爸真好,两个女儿长得漂亮,尤其是大女儿!后来才意识到她演过无耻之徒里卡尔的女盆友(第一任)。恶魔现身从男主嘴里爬出来看起来黏糊糊的有点恶心,看时总想@隔壁SPN两兄弟赶紧过来帮你老爸抓鬼啦!★★☆
又是这种老套的驱魔故事,况且那鬼还那么容易驱!
情节老套,明显模仿《The Exosict》,但电影的恐怖气氛做得不错,特别是一个人在电影院看的时候。宁静的背景声+突然大声音效,或者point of view shot慢慢移动+突然鬼出现等
不是很吓人。不过那小女孩真心演技派!
万圣节之夜🎃推荐:这不是那种动不动忽然吓你一跳的鬼片,也不是那种俗套的驱魔片。节奏缓慢剧情却紧凑,导演对紧张的气氛处理的挺好的。豆瓣又只有5.8分!我只想说:看恐怖片影评别上豆瓣!!!
总的来说不是很吓人,但是小女孩真心演技派,还有那谁谁说男主长的像黄秋生,瞬间喜感了好么,这合适么。。。=-=还是觉得期待下十月的那部。