iGhosts have arrived. Or at least the first horror film made exclusively for iOS devices has. While the scare-your-pants off premise of Haunting Melissa is relatively straightforward, it is told in a series of fragmented chapters, that together make for a narrative experience that is equal parts interactive novel and Blair Witch Project. The twist is that the film's experience is tied up with its mobile setting: it runs transparently alongside other apps and features some clips that even look as though they could have been recorded by the device itself. The app also requires that viewers share the film on their Facebook profiles in order to watch in its entirety, and new chapters, which drop at unexpected intervals, are heralded by Instagram-like notifications.

The film was directed by longtime David Lynch collaborator, Neil Edelstein, who produced Mullholland Drive as well as other Hollywood standards and is nothing if not a master of online storytelling, having been behind the late ‘90‘s launch of DavidLynch.com. Haunting Melissa is also an interesting alternative take on the recent Dutch horror film App, in which evil technology-gone-haywire leads to a dystopian downfall. The experience also included a companion app meant to be used in conjunction with the film, but full-on horror film integrated into the mobile experience is certainly a fresh take whose future applications we look forward to seeing.