Alternative History

The Awakening is a 1992 American horror film produced by Presley R. Cline and directed by Ambrose Webster, starring Liam Neeson, Wendy Crewson, Miko Hughes, and Sidney Poitier. The film is based on the 1987 Ben Corrin novel of the same name.

When aspiring writer and former schoolteacher Jack Connell (Neeson) is selected as the winter caretaker of the old High Bluff Hotel, deep in the Jefferson Rockies, his wife Emily and six year-old son Danny are both somewhat apprehensive, and, unbeknownst to them, for a very good reason. The hotel has a dark past, the darkest parts of which only young Danny – a psychic – can see, through a process called ‘Awakening.’ Several months go by largely without incident, but in late December, shortly after Christmas, Jack undergoes a sudden mental breakdown and recurrence of his alcoholism. And, as the hotel itself slowly begins to fall apart from malfunctions one after another, over the next two weeks, Jack begins to go insane and becomes violent, threatening not only his family’s safety, but their minds and souls as well...