Hmm, everyone seems intent on believing that a demon was involved somehow, but I have a theory that there was no demon involved. As shown at the end of the movie, it is possible that everything was simply in her mind. From beginning to end, all the words, experiences, and events that occur were all fabricated within her head. She actually did go from place to place and had conversations, but all the noises and all the conversations she had with her friends were hallucinations.
Why? Well, that was also explained at the end. She wanted so desperately to be a psychologist, and worked herself exhaustively to do it. When her friend, Timmy, told her about the urban legend, her mind basically took it, and ran with it. All the events she hallucinated were basically things she fabricated from simple clues and feelings she had in reality.
For example, Timmy's homosexuality? It was stated that Timmy never had a boyfriend and that her religious background seem to be well known. Alice probably took this as a sign of repressed homosexuality. Jock's seemingly relentless poor behavior? A result of Alice's negative feelings towards him from when he got them kicked out.
The above may also explain Scott's and Jazz's hallucinated personalities. She knew little about them other than that Scott is really nice to her and Jazz seems to be a normal person. It also explains the very last hallucination; her confrontation with her father. Once she convinced herself that these experiences were real, she confronted her fear about her father's suicide, and basically told herself what she had always believed.
Of course, the above theory still leaves two things unexplained. For example, the various facts which we saw during the course of the movie that Alice couldn't have possibly known (such as Scott's spying on her). Simply put, this was a part of the movie meant solely for the viewers, and was not a part of Alice's imagination (thus why she did not experienced it).
The other unexplained variable is the Ouija board thing at the end, but another user explained this pretty well. Alice had already hanged herself and she made contact with the others, thus why the ghost called itself 'Alice'.
This is a pretty wild theory, I know, but I thought it held enough plausibility for me to suggest it.
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Pleased to meet you.
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thurgix_haurach
13 years ago
I just watched the movie and for the most part I agree with you. I know (from experience) that extreme sleep deprivation, such as Alice was putting herself through can cause night terrors. Dreams so utterly real that your body actually acts them out while asleep. You CAN have entire conversations with people and in extreme cases perform many of the same functions you would while awake. And as Alice was studying psychology that explains many of the interactions she had with these dream versions of her friends. For me that also explains her knowing about Scott spying on her because she already knows about his technical prowess with gadgets and knowing his personality the way she does (she is probably also very well aware of his crush on her)...it's not really such a big leap to make a connection that he spies on her.
I really feel that the Ouija scene is the only actual paranormal event in the film.
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SBL84
13 years ago
I don't think it was just sleep deprivation. I think there had to be something else involved. She spent the whole night walking around from room to room talking to people that weren't there, and she slept the night before anyway. So it's not like she was up for a week straight and her mind was doing weird things.
And none of the other four were up at all at any time to see her wandering around in a trance? Or hear her talking to the hallucinated versions of them? Especially since she must have been walking in and out of their rooms over and over.
If a demon could control her, it could probably keep them all asleep, or make them otherwise not see her if they woke up.
Her sleep deprivation may have made her more susceptible to the demon's control, also the fact that she insisted to be left alone, and the demon was described as controlling people when they're alone and making them die in an apparent suicide.
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bacardi119
11 years ago
I just have one question. Her friends never died then, right?. Was she immagening her friends dying one by one, like the other kids?
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