A movie producer for Paramount, Issac, needs a low budget film to sell. His secretary, Sheila, finds a dime-store novel called _This is Us _that tells the story of a young couple whose marriage falls apart as they restore a crumbling townhouse in a new city. Sheila pitches the idea to Issac who agrees that it would make a good adaptation, though Issac can’t bring himself to read the book all the way through. Sheila agrees that the book is unsettling, as it feels like the author and the reader are finding joy in pulling the couple apart. Issac begins putting together a cast and crew for the movie. Sheila suggests a famous French director, Laurent Loubet, and they also get two famous actors to play the leads— Bruce Mountford and Jayne Southern. As the movie begins production, the author of the book, Carl Monkton, asks the studio not to produce the movie. Monkton says that he wished he had never written the book and goes to the studio to try and get Issac to stop the production. One night, Issac wakes and finds Monkton banging on his window trying to get in. Issac calls security and the security officer gets Monkton knocked out, but only after a struggle and the author laughing maniacally. Monkton later says that he never went to Issac’s house.  There are a lot of hold-ups for the movie, causing the production to get slightly behind schedule. As they begin filming, Jayne begins to act distant and combative to the crew. The Make-up artist thinks that Jayne trashes her trailer at one point, but cannot confront her about it. Loubet tries to get a very specific lighting and feel for the movie, which the rest of the crew has difficulty dealing with. As they are doing an argument scene in a kitchen, Jayne is supposed to throw a pot of water on Bruce, however, she stops during filming and looks through the set window and begins to scream. Soon after, Jayne drives into a brick wall and dies instantly. While some blame it on drugs, Jayne’s sister, Brenda, believes that there is something else behind her death as an eyewitness said that an identical looking figure was in the car with Jayne right before the accident. Nobody believes Brenda, however upon reviewing the film from the scene, Loubet sees a brief shot of a figure that looks exactly like Jayne standing behind the set window, whose mouth is slowly unhinging itself and staring her down. Loubet goes to the desert and burns the entirety of the film negatives.  Monkton recalls writing the book in a fever-induced frenzy as he is vacationing in Prague. He doesn’t remember writing most of the book, but does remember that on his last night in the city he wakes up and sees a figure in the dark staring him down and it’s jaw slowly unhinging. He believes that since then, the figure still follows him. Sheila visits the grave of Jayne and one day sees Issac sitting at the grave bent over it. She later asks him about the incident and he says that he has never been to Jayne’s grave. Sheila believes him.