Every year, horror fans are treated to a smattering of books and films that attempt to innovate the genre. Maybe they find a new way to repackage slasher films, like Joss Whedon did in Cabin in the Woods, or they find a new way to present their story, like the “found footage” format of Paranormal Activity. One way to spice up tried and true tropes is to draw on different source material to craft your story.
The western horror tradition draws on a shared body of common folklore standardized by western society and pop culture to create its tales of suspense and terror. But, if you want a rich body of folklore chock-full of the strange and supernatural that isn’t as familiar or well understood, you only have to look towards Jewish mythology for new ways of exploring the supernatural. Creative forces in Hollywood have discovered the power of Jewish folklore, as is evident from big budget movies like the recent The Possession and 2009’s The Unborn. But do they get their stories straight? For example, what is a dybbuk and can it really live in a box? And what about a golem? Let’s take a look at some of the denizens of the darkest parts of Jewish tradition to see what goes bump in the night.
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