Now for a “change of pace”—sort of. I like watching YouTube videos about abandoned and “ghostly” places. The 1962 film Carnival of Souls utilized what was the second incarnation of the Great Saltair pavilion outside of Salt Lake City, which had long been abandoned as the lake shoreline receded into the distance. It would “mysteriously” burn down just as its first iteration did, and “replaced” yet again. Today the closest shore of the Great Salt Lake is miles away, the new Saltair serves as a music venue.
But it’s “spookiness” back then was an obvious setting for a horror film:
There are other true tales with a certain grimness that reaches the level of horror. I suppose that some people might remember this scene in the 1950 film classic Sunset Boulevard, when William Holden’s character is trying to use the phone, except that he can’t at the moment because this young woman is busy with it:
Although uncredited in her first screen appearance, she is Yvette Vickers. According to IMDB she appeared in some pretty good films; in my film collection those would include Boulevard, Pressure Point and Hud, but “appeared in” are the operative words. The other film she is in that I have in my collection is probably her most memorable “performance,” in the grade-z horror film Attack of the Giant Leeches. The year that came out Vickers was also a Playboy Playmate (she didn’t “show” anything though), but she was the “best” thing in a film that was lampooned by Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Anyways, the reason why I bring this is up is because when Vickers died in her Beverley Hills home in 2010, it was of some interest of those interested in the macabre.
People Magazine reported that
“She was bright and intelligent, but she became very paranoid about people stalking her and talking about her behind her back,” her longtime friend Boyd Magers, 70, of Western Clippings magazine tells PEOPLE. “She lost her looks. She became very overweight.” She also became “delusional” after she was no longer being invited to film festivals that tended to be “an ego boost for a lot of actors and actresses who have been forgotten from Hollywood,” says Magers.
“She would say she owned property in places that she didn’t,” he says. “She thought a casting agent was doing her harm, and I don’t think that was true. She drank too much alcohol, no doubt about that.” And she began cutting important people out of her life because she thought they were trying to harm her.
People naturally assumed she just wanted to be left alone, and so they did. But it came to the point when neighbors and “friends” started to forget the last time they saw her. One day a neighbor noticed that there were cobwebs in Vickers’ mailbox full of yellowing letters. She decided to pay her neighbor a visit, found a door that was barely hanging on, and investigating the collapsing infrastructure found what appeared to be the mummified blob of “something” with blonde hair sticking to it in an upstairs room.
Although the remains were unidentifiable, it was assumed to be Vickers, and that she had been dead for at least a year—which, frankly is a long time for a neighbor to decide to suddenly become “concerned” about what happened to her.
A couple of years ago I composed this post 1 concerning people living alone and dying alone, sometimes unnoticed for months and even years in the case of an Italian woman; she was found still sitting in a chair. In New York City, 1,500 people are discovered dead in their homes with no apparent living relatives, or at least none who want to admit they are relatives.
In Japan, there is such a disconnect between parents and children that every year an estimated 30,000 people commit what is called kodokushi, in which aged people simply decide to quit life and lay in bed until they die.
In this case reported by The Guardian about a woman named Sandra Drummond
…who left few possessions when she died. Police found in her bedroom a pot of Vaseline, a hot water bottle, a stuffed koala, a roll of Sellotape and a child's snow globe. It wasn't much to show for 44 years. But these scattered items were the only clues to her identity. Her body had lain undiscovered for almost 12 months until the gas company forced the door to her upstairs flat in Hulme, Manchester, in July 2007. The corpse was so decomposed that an inquest could not determine the cause of death. No living relatives could be traced. No mourners attended her funeral.
Another British woman, Joyce Carol Vincent, was dead in her flat for three years, and according to The Sun, "with the TV still tuned to BBC when she was found due to accumulated unpaid rent.” I mean, the landlord waited three years to make an inquiry about unpaid rent? In the case of the Italian woman, it might have been a few more years if it hadn’t been if people were “concerned” after a storm had felled a tree. Homeless people who die on the streets have a better chance of being “discovered” than people who actually have a place to live.
Now why am I talking about this? Well, obviously in regard to the strange case of film legend Gene Hackman and his wife Betsy Arakawa, both discovered not moving by the caretaker eight days after the 95-year-old Hackman’s death of heart failure and effects of Alzheimer’s Disease, and two weeks after Arakawa died of hantavirus, a disease contracted from the feces of rodents that has no known cure. The BBC notes that
Medical experts say it's possible the 95-year-old, who was in declining health and suffering from advanced stages of Alzheimer's disease, did not even realize his wife of more than 30 years was dead in the home where he was living. If he did, experts told the BBC, he likely went through various stages of confusion and grief, trying to wake her up before the disease caused him to become distracted or too overwhelmed to act - a process that likely repeated for days before he, too, died.
Although authorities ruled the deaths by natural causes, police still thought their deaths were “suspicious,” and in fact there were “suspicious” circumstances. Arakawa was last seen alive on February 11 making errands about town and seemed chipper and fit despite her 65 years. However it was believed she died later that evening, since she did not respond to emails or text messages.
But that narrative changed when it was discovered that she had made contact with a local clinic the next day, reporting that she had “congestion.” Arakawa apparently had some kind of health issue for which she had an appointment at the clinic on February 10, but perhaps feeling “better” she canceled the appointment. But two days later she apparently felt ill again with “congestion” and called the clinic; hantavirus can “incubate” quickly and cause unexpected and rapid deterioration of body organs, and cause fluid to fill the lungs, and cause instant death.
Arakawa was told that a doctor would not go to her home because she didn’t have a doctor-client relationship at the clinic, and that she would have to make a personal appearance. Several attempt were made to set-up this appointment, but Arakawa did not respond to such attempts.
Now, the question is why didn’t anyone at the clinic wonder if there was something seriously amiss and contact police to make a “welfare check”? They must have known that her husband was very old and had Alzheimer’s, so unless someone was just annoyed by the canceled appointment and didn’t want to deal with someone who was making a “habit” of “wasting” their time, simply decided to ignore the worst scenario.
The caretaker didn’t have access to the house since the doors were locked, but he could see through the windows that the bodies lay in nearby rooms. Now what would have happened if Hackman and his wife had died, say, in upstairs rooms? How long would it have taken to discover their bodies? The Hackmans were living a secluded life and hadn’t been seen in public for over two decades. His wife kept his contacts with “fans” down to a minimum, and friends apparently had little incentive to visit. The fact that Hackman’s three children were not named in his will indicates that there was some lasting effect to what Hackman admitted to not spending much time with his children when they were growing up.
What is interesting about this is that even a famous actor (at least for people in my age group) like Hackman could have been dead for months without being “discovered.” Both his and his wife’s bodies were already in the process of “mummification” when they were found. If that had been the case, then we might actually have a serious discussion about how we live in a world—even in “first world” countries—where there can be so little human connection.
And let’s face it: we live in a country where we see the "trickle-down" effect of hate, divisiveness and narcissism that if it continues in the way it is going, civil society may die an equally lonely "death"--although to be honest, if the principle perpetrator of this state of affairs today was to pass away "suddenly," I wouldn't waste any time in "mourning," but only to wonder if this society even wishes to be a "family" again.
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