| Originally appearing as a 100 line poem entitled "Paranoid: A Chant" in Stephen King's 1985 short story collection Skeleton Crew, first published in 1985 as a limited edition hardcover by Scream Press, Paranoid - the film - is a short adaptation done by Los Angeles-based director and cinematographer Jay Holben.
Opening in a dilapidated motel room crouching deep within the seedier parts of an unnamed city, we slowly venture inside to the last refuge of a troubled woman. With the meticulousness that seems to be only afforded to the deeply disturbed, she carefully catalogues each infinite detail of her nightmarish existence in hundreds of composition notebooks as waitresses replace salt with arsenic, old ladies place electronic suction cups on their floor upstairs to send out rays through light fixtures and They send puppies with radio cobwebs in their noses to keep track of her. Everywhere she turns there is another ominous shadow following, listening. We can only watch helplessly as a besieged soul desperately cries out for help. We can witness the strengths of her deprived delusions and wonder - what was that sound outside? -William Denbrough-
This film was released on DVD by Inside DVD (Total Movie Entertainment) with comments by Jay Holben and interviews with Buck Sanders (original score) and Alek Vila (sound design).
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