My brother is visiting from North Bend, WA and as we were walking all around the city last night he joked that his town has been famously featured in film as well. David Lynch filmed Twin Peaks all over North Bend, which is extremely woodsy, mountainous, and glazed with a misty fog - perfect scene for a creepy who-done-it mystery, which is also why the main gas station my brother visits nearly every other day is the scene of Sandra Bullock’s disappearance in The Vanishing.

I’ve never seen The Vanishing and thought it might be fun to watch an early 90s psycho-thriller set in familiar territory, so I went to Alan’s Alley only to discover that the 93’ version is in fact a remake of a 1988 Dutch film Spoorloos, translated in English as The Vanishing and filmed by the same director George Sluizer. The video store only had a VHS of the 93 version, so I picked up the original and I’m glad I did.

Where to start with this film. The basic plot involves a young couple - Saskia and Rex-on holiday who stop at a gas station before heading out on a cycling trip. There, Saskia mysteriously disappears and Rex spends the next three years obsessed with finding out what happened to her. There’s a lot of foreshadowing, so much so that every move of the story makes sense, yet still feels unpredictable. This film breaks a lot of cliches found in suspenseful films today. First off, the abductor is revealed instantly and the passing of time is used to tap into the sociopath Raymond’s psyche, revealing a chemistry teacher and family man with an odd obsession with proving to himself that he’s not the hero his daughter sees him as.  As you begin to understand Raymond’s motivation, you see Rex’s obsession spiral, ultimately leading him to the same destiny as Saskia, which is revealed in the final, chilling scene. As much as I’d like to see home in the movies, I have a feeling the original, which is apparently highly acclaimed, was the better film of the two. Watch it!