Editorials
John Candy’s Character in ‘Home Alone’ May Be The Devil
Fan theories are some of the most fascinating and potentially utterly absurd things on the face of this planet. They take a story and spin wild ideas out of it, nitpicking the most trivial of details and making it seem like a true conspiracy. I’m willing to be the writers are probably scratching their heads out of confusion.
Still, some of them are thoroughly entertaining and add a nice sinister twist to a story. Such is the case with Reddit user drewgarr who posits that John Candy’s character “Gus Polinski” from the children’s holiday film Home Alone is actually The Devil in disguise, intent on taking the soul of Catherine O’Hara’s “Kate McCallister”. You can read the theory below.
drewgarr‘s theory laid out (with some quick and dirty spelling and grammar corrections):
During a Christmas movie Marathon, I started rewatching home alone 1. The movie is filled with great memories and scenes, but one thing that I think has been overlooked is that Kate McCallister actually sold her soul to get home to Chicago .
First let me point out the scene about the 1:04 mark.
Notice in this scene, just as she says “If I have to sell my soul to the devil himself”, it is that we now see Gus take notice of Kate and approach her before the airline rep can further help her, in anyway possible.
So what makes me think he is the devil, or a deal demon? My evidence is the location. The Scranton airport. More specifically the crossroads located right at the airport. At this point I want to point out the myth regarding the crossroads demon. In a nutshell, it means that you can give an offering to the devil (in this case her soul) near a cross roads, the devil will show up and deliver it in exchange for the offering
It is after this scene that Gus offers Kate a ride to Chicago (to what she was willing to sell her soul for) to which she agrees to, essentially selling her soul. It is at this moment Gus smiles and points out to his friend renting the van, showing her he is honoring his side of deal since she already put up her side (already agreed to a ride for her soul). It is here where she says “Yes” and the next scene we see that she did in fact accept the ride
One last piece of evidence that I have found is Gus choice of instrument. Sure it’s not as obvious as a fiddle, instead it’s a woodwind instrument. There are some references in the bible that one of the instruments are created and favored by the devil (my understanding at least)
It is a bit of a silly one, but enough to make you think.
Meanwhile, user Honest_Coxy adds another interesting twist: “You could also add in the ironic twist of fate that usually accompanies dealings with the devil, in this case it is the fact that if she stayed in the airport she would have arrived home at almost the exact same time.”
What do you think? There are some interesting concepts here but, at the same time, it seems a bit too evil for a kids movie.
There’s been a lot of talk about how Christopher Nolan snuck in some horror elements into his epic adaptation of The Odyssey. However, even before the Cyclops began to eat Ithican soldiers and Circe subjected them to magical body-horror, cinemagoers were already witnessing supernatural terror through a certain trailer that was attached to most IMAX screenings of Nolan’s film.
It turns out that this trailer was for Rob Savage’s Other Mommy, an adaptation of Bird Box author Josh Malerman’s horror novel, Incidents Around the House. With the teaser now available online and revealing that the award-winning Jessica Chastain is playing the titular antagonist (as well as her ill-fated human counterpart), not to mention the fact that the picture is being helmed by the director of hits like Host and The Boogeyman, genre fans are understandably hyped for this upcoming thriller.
That’s why I’ve decided to take a closer look at the trailer and share four things we learned from this sneak peek at Other Mommy!
4. Rob Savage is Going Back to His Supernatural Horror Roots
I know I’m in the minority when I admit that Dashcam is my favorite Rob Savage movie, but even I understand why the filmmakers’ fans have been waiting a while for the director to get back to telling more grounded paranormal stories as he did with 2020’s Host.
Other Mommy obviously isn’t a found footage movie, but moments like the poltergeist activity on the kitchen table combined with the nature of the source material, which actually features a full-on exorcism, indicate that this adaptation is more than a simple creature feature. That’s why I think Savage is once again going to borrow from the same ghostly narratives that made his debut film such a viral hit.
3. Other Mommy is a More Convincing Doppelganger in the Adaptation
Part of the horror from Malerman’s original novel came from the fact that the entity taking on the form of Bela’s (Arabella Olivia Clark) mother wasn’t very good at passing itself off as human. This resulted in several uncanny moments where other characters began to notice that there was something visibly wrong with the family and decided to keep their distance.
Savage’s film appears to be taking a different route, with the trailer showing a version of the entity that can, at least physically, imitate Chastain’s character perfectly. This change is likely the result of the filmmakers wanting to incorporate more paranoid scenes where Bela and her father, played by Jay Duplass, are confused about which Mommy is safe to interact with.
2. The Family is Also Better Off This Time Around
Incidents Around the House featured some interesting subtext about how poverty can negatively affect American family dynamics. After all, the main characters were already feeling scared and isolated before the entity emerged from Bela’s closet and began scratching at their emotional wounds. The trailer for the movie, however, depicts the family as being relatively well off before these incidents begin to occur.
I can only imagine that this part of the story was changed so that the family’s fall from grace can be even more dramatic as the mom and dad’s pasts are revealed and Bela falls further into the clutches of the demonic antagonist.
1. Jessica Chastain is Embodying Evil Dead Rise’s Alyssa Sutherland
Mothers turning against their children is one of the most disturbing horror tropes out there (just check out classics like Hereditary and Carrie if you need proof), but it takes a remarkably skilled actress to pull off such a monstrous transformation. This is especially true when both a regular, loving mother and the Other share the screen in the same film.
That’s why I appreciate how Chastain appears to be channeling another evil redhead mother that recently traumatized audiences with her performance. It’s too early to be sure, but I’m fairly confident that Chastain’s character has at least some amount of Ellie in her cinematic DNA – Ellie being the iconic deadite brought to life by Australian actress Alyssa Sutherland in 2023’s Evil Dead Rise.
Let us know in the comments if you think we missed any important details from the trailer, and don’t forget to check out Other Mommy when it hits theaters on October 9!
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