From Within Me (formerly entitled “The Tulpa Effect”) – Horror Thriller
By Anna Maria Elisa Manalo
Logline: An Argentinean priest must stop a woman and her evil thought creation, a “thoughtform” from killing members of her family.
Synopsis: FATHER LUNA, a 31-year-old priest unjustly accused of child molestation but acquitted, encounters a writer who is plagued by a goat-like specter the man believes he created. One night, left alone, the man commits suicide. His death enrages the specter and it embarks on a killing spree which the priest must stop.
Embroiled in a case he feels unprepared to handle, Father Luna visits the man’s widow, SENECA who resists his efforts to protect her and her infant son. The police suspect Father Luna as the man behind the murders as he seems to be the last person seen with each of the victims. At a party at her parents’ estate, Seneca’s baby disappears after Father Luna departs without notice to pick up the archdiocese’s exorcist, FATHER PINOCHET.
As Pinochet attempts a traditional exorcism on the writer’s house, Father Luna finds allies in Seneca’s two younger brothers. Receptive to his efforts, they introduce Luna to a Buddhist monk, LAMA TSUMPA who believes the family is haunted by a “Tulpa” – a specter created by the power of the mind. The Lama believes Seneca and Javier’s union had unwittingly conjured the thoughtform which is avenging them against the adults who molested them in childhood.
As the search for the missing infant continues, Father Luna’s dog leads the police to an abandoned shack where they find the infant and meet the winged goat-faced specter. In a terrifying confrontation, the inspector mistakes the attacking specter for the dog and shoots it. He arrests Father Luna. Back at the estate, Seneca’s ailing mother reveals to her that it was Seneca’s father, PAULO who had raped Seneca as a child – and still lives with them. Enraged, betrayed and filled with guilt over the deaths, Seneca sketches with abandon, unwittingly summoning the specter once again.
Seneca’s brother bails out Father Luna who joins forces with the monk to defeat the specter. That night at the family estate, the specter enters the house, bent on destroying Seneca’s childhood tormentor. Under the guidance of the gentle Lama, Seneca sketches the face of her father. Now identified, the specter pursues Paulo who takes off in his car. As the car falls into a creek behind the writer’s house, the specter enters Paulo’s body and the car explodes. Vindicated, cleared of charges and his credibility restored, Father Luna bows with Seneca, Father Pinochet and the police inspector to pray for the victims of the “Tulpa”.
