Haunted

Steven Spielberg was certain his copy of "Paranormal Activity" was haunted. It was early 2008, and the director's DreamWorks studio was trying to decide whether it wanted to be a part of the micro-budgeted supernatural thriller. As the story goes, Spielberg had taken a "Paranormal Activity" DVD to his Pacific Palisades estate, and not long after he watched it, the door to his empty bedroom inexplicably locked from the inside, forcing him to summon a locksmith. While Spielberg didn't want the "Paranormal Activity" disc anywhere near his home -- he brought the movie back to DreamWorks in a garbage bag, colleagues say -- he very much shared his studio's enthusiasm for director Oren Peli's haunting story about the demonic invasion of a couple's suburban tract house.

BOSTON - The first victim the doctor approached was a slender young woman, her legs exposed and bloody where she fell after the explosions: at the edge of Boylston Street near a mangled stroller and toppled barricades. Dr. Natalie Stavas performed CPR with the help of a stranger until paramedics arrived and loaded the woman, still unresponsive, onto a backboard and headed for the hospital. Stavas, 32, had been near the finish of the Boston Marathon herself. She was covered in sweat and Gatorade, shivering, with numbness descending into her legs.

"Twenty push-ups, let's go!" Coach Potter shouted. My arms already felt like I'd been lifting trucks, but when Coach tells you to push up, you push up. He's a nice guy, but he looks like the Terminator. All of us were groaning by the time we reached 20 and collapsed on the mats. "Fragadellic job, fellas!" Coach told us. None of us knew what fragadellic meant, but he said it whenever he was pleased, and we weren't going to argue. I had barely enough strength to change back into my school clothes.

BEIRUT - Syrian President Bashar Assad warned in a television interview Wednesday that the war against his government risked spreading to neighboring Jordan and predicted that rebel fighters, whom he described as Islamic extremists, would later take their violence to the West. Speaking on the pro-government Syrian channel Al Ikhbariya, Assad presented himself as a staunch patriot who was fending off meddling by the West. He appeared to be wooing Syrians wearied by the country's bloodshed, disillusioned by all sides and desperate for Syria's conflict to end. Assad charged that the United States and Europe were supporting his Islamist opponents.

Vampires may be getting all the glory these days, but when it comes to day-in, day-out spooky family entertainment, it's hard to beat ghosts. The popularity of ghost and paranormal stories are nothing new -- from the King's ghost in Shakespeare's "Hamlet" to Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" to the phenomenal box office last fall for "Paranormal Activity." But it's on the small screen that ghosts are most alive -- a staple of the medium, so to speak. The first two hours of CBS' Friday night lineup are devoted to "Ghost Whisperer," now in its fifth season, and "Medium," which joined the network last fall after five seasons on NBC. Both dramatic series revolve around women who can see dead people.

The defendant met with his lawyer once for 15 minutes before he was sentenced to death and hanged. When the lawyer complained to authorities, they ignored her. When she tried to enter the courtroom where he was being tried, they threatened her with arrest. And when she spoke out publicly at what she described as a gross miscarriage of justice, they shut off her cellphone. "Unfortunately, despite repeated warnings, you have kept contacts with counter-revolutionary media and for two months from today your cellphone will be cut off," read a text message she received.

"The Ghost Comes Calling" Betty Ren Wright Chad finds out there's a ghost haunting Shaky Acres. Every time Chad goes to sleep, the ghost haunts him. He tries to tell his dad, but his dad doesn't believe him. So Chad tries to get evidence. I thought this would be a regular ghost story, but it wasn't. If you like a ghost story, read this. Reviewed by Amadeus, 10 Third Street Elementary Los Angeles "The Monster's Ring" Bruce Coville A kid named Russell gets this ring from an old man. On Halloween, Russell tries to get revenge on Eddie because Eddie hurt Russell.

Walt Disney Pictures is going back to the theme park. The studio announced today that it was developing a new film based on its Haunted Mansion attraction, a live-action monster picture that uses characters and elements from the haunted house. Upping the news -- and intrigue -- level is the filmmaker taking it on: Genre auteur Guillermo del Toro will direct the film and co-write it with his "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark" co-scribe Matthew Robbins. Guillermo del toro The news quells, at least for the moment, speculation about Del Toro's next move after unexpectedly leaving "The Hobbit" last month, though it's still conceivable the director could take on another development project.

Even after the costumes are worn, the candy collected and the ghoulish jack-o'-lantern has turned back into a pumpkin, Halloween doesn't have to be over -- if you are willing to be entertained by a good ghost story. Almost anywhere you look in Southern California, it seems, from private houses to public places, tales abound about the shades of the living walking among us. The spirits are benign for the most part, said Laurie Jacobson, a TV producer, historian and writer who specializes in the haunted side of Hollywood.

THE POLITICAL storyteller envies the political reality of 2008. Compared with the gray mediocrities usually offered up by the Republican and Democratic parties for the presidency, John McCain and Barack Obama are true characters. The grizzled war hero who's been a fixture on the political landscape for a generation, the brilliant young street-organizer who comes out of nowhere to electrify the country -- these are archetypes that could populate the likes of "The Best Man," "Advise and Consent," "The Manchurian Candidate."

Last Halloween season, if you passed by the corner of 2nd Street and Broadway, you might have wondered what all the quivering, shrieking people were doing streaming out of that darkened office building. The explanation was the first L.A. edition of the New York City-based extreme haunted house Blackout. For a few weeks in late fall, Angelenos willfully submitted to Blackout's deep dive into psycho-sexual torture scenarios and total sensory deprivation. L.A. horror fans must be a masochistic bunch - tickets were sold out, and Blackout had to add on a week of dates just to meet the demand for heebie-jeebies.

Mariel Hemingway, makeup-free and in sweats, is gorgeous. That bone structure, her cheetah-like build and flowing hair have been familiar for decades. What's disarming is her forthright approach to a rough family history and her determination to live the happy and healthy life that eluded so many of her relatives. She knows a lot, she says, about what it takes to live a happy life - no matter your cheekbones or pedigree. Perhaps it's because she's seen enough unhappiness to last many lifetimes: for starters, the suicides of her supermodel sister and her legendary grandfather, as well as five other relatives.

GUZHEN, China - At 58, Zhang Hongbing is still tormented by the death of his mother more than four decades ago. She was a victim of China's Cultural Revolution, executed by firing squad during Chairman Mao Tse-tung's decadelong purge of capitalism, cultural elites and political rivals. As a 15-year-old Red Guard, Zhang denounced her to authorities. Today Zhang is a lawyer, and he is trying to make amends for his past. He has officially cleared his mother's name of the charges for which she was killed, and he has reconciled with relatives.

"The Accursed," an astonishing fever dream of a novel, sets loose specters from the beyond to prey on innocent and guilty alike. But are there any real innocents in the diseased society Oates so scathingly depicts? Making skillful use of gothic fiction's time-honored conventions - demon lovers, haunted houses, guilty secrets, murderous transformations, supernatural visitations - the author repeatedly connects these unearthly manifestations to moral rot in the real world, in this case the "claustrophobic little world of privilege and anxiety" that is Princeton, N.J., in 1905 and '06. The president of Princeton University is Woodrow Wilson, embroiled in a power struggle with a popular dean over his desire to curb the eating clubs that dominate the school's social life.

Mesmerizing and haunting, "The Jeffrey Dahmer Files" is an inside-out serial killer movie, lacking in gore or cheap psychology and made in part for those who think they never want to see another serial killer movie. A hybrid of documentary and fiction, the film is directed by Milwaukee-based Chris James Thompson in his feature debut. Rather than indulging in exploitation kicks, the film engages more with Dahmer's impact on the community. The fictional footage features Andrew Swant as the notorious Dahmer, who murdered and dismembered 17 people; he seems to be a bland, weird-but-harmless blank slate.

"The Haunting in Connecticut 2: Ghosts of Georgia" might win for most unwieldy title of the year, but there's little else to distinguish this movie, related to the 2009 film in name only, from the recent crop of supernatural horror thrillers supposedly based on true stories. Here, a family moves to a remote property picked up on the cheap, and the young daughter (Emily Alyn Lind) begins to share the same "gift" as her mother and aunt (Abigail Spencer, Katie Sackhoff), an ability to see and communicate with spirits.

In the eight years he has hosted the hippest haunted house in Simi Valley, Kyle Killips has dealt with his share of monsters, bloody ghouls and even a sadistic clown. But his scariest encounter occurred Oct. 16 when a city code enforcement officer posted a notice ordering him to tear down his 1,200-square-foot "Haunted Hills" maze in 72 hours or be fined. "We thought, 'That's it, it's over,' " said Killips, 37, whose day job is running the family's plastics company in Burbank.

Perhaps now is the time to insist that Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" be required reading by everyone. FRANK J. ARNICH Camarillo

More than a year after the Costa Concordia capsized off Italy, one big question still haunts survivor Michelle Barraclough: Why were no clear instructions given during the emergency? "The crew had no idea what to do," the Australian woman wrote on a blog posted soon after the wreck, "and the order to evacuate took [way] too long. " The ship trembled and lights went out some time after the vessel struck a rock about 9:45 p.m. on Jan. 13, 2012. Passengers said they were told the problem was electrical, according to news accounts.

There is something about me that is happier when accompanied by a small boy.... Perhaps besides the sexual element, the child in me wants a playmate. -- Father Robert Van Handel -- Damian Eckert turned on the computer in his in-laws' home office, a tiny, dim, book-strewn space. He left the door open so he could hear his 5-year-old daughter playing in the next room. He pulled up a website and scanned it for Father Robert Van Handel, the priest who led the community boys choir he and his younger brother sang in when they were growing up in Santa Barbara.