Netflix released the film The Appearance of Things on Thursday , starring Amanda Seyfried and James Norton . This horror thriller is based on the eponymous book by Elizabeth Brundange . To write it, the author was inspired in turn by a heinous crime that occurred in New York in 1982 .
Directed by Robert Pulcini and Shari Springer Berman, the film tells the story of a Manhattan couple who move to a historic village in the Hudson Valley in search of a simpler life. There, Catherine Clare (Seyfried) discovers that both her husband George (Norton) and their new home hold sinister secrets .
In the movie trailer you can see that the protagonist finds an old book . Then, various supernatural phenomena occur . Finally, a bloody ax appears , desperate cries for help, a patrol car and a person who awakens in a hospital. In 120 minutes, the drama, suspense and terror manage to take over the audience.
But that’s not all: according to the Democrat & Chronicle , the Brundage book on which this film is based was inspired by an alleged femicide that took place in Brighton, New York.
It was in 1982, when Cathleen Krauseneck was found dead in her bed, with an ax embedded in her head . Their three-year-old daughter had been in the house for several hours with the body , before the woman’s husband, named James Krauseneck , reportedly returned from work to discover the gruesome scene.
Cathleen and James Krauseneck with their little daughter Sara (Courtesy The News Tribune /)
The author acknowledged in dialogue with the news portal that she used the main elements of the murder to write her novel. “As a novelist, I was trying to do the right thing with Cathleen,” he added.
When the book was published in 2016, there had been no arrests for this crime. However, three years later, Krauseneck , who is now 67, was charged with second-degree murder. The start of the trial is scheduled for next June.
According to the newspaper The News Tribune , what convinced the authorities that the victim’s husband was the perpetrator of the crime is that ” no DNA of anyone else was found inside the family home.” Krauseneck was released after posting a $ 100,000 bond. And he was accompanied by his daughter Sara to the last court hearing, where he was ordered to hand over his passport to prevent his escape.
James Krauseneck is 67 years old and, in 2019, was indicted for murder in the second degree (Courtesy The News Tribune /)
Brundage revealed that the Netflix movie has components from his novel and that both bear similarities to the 1982 femicide and the people involved.
For example, in the true story, James lied about finishing his doctorate , first to his bosses at the University of Virginia; and later to the Eastman Kodak Company in Rochester. This was discovered by his wife and generated a family conflict. While, in the Netflix production, George Clare is a professor of Art History at the fictional Saginaw College, and he also hides a secret .
In turn, in the film the couple move into a house that contains dark mysteries. And, in the case of the Krauseneck family, there are reports that the previous inhabitants of that house died of accidental carbon monoxide poisoning, after leaving a car engine running in the garage.
The appearance of things also has within the cast the actress of Stranger Things , Natalia Dyer, Rhea Seehorn, Alex Neustaedter and F. Murray Abraham.