The Lost Children
The Story of Evelyn Hamilton and the Cult of The Lost Children

---

---

 

When people joined the Hierarchy of The Lost Children, they were required to abandon all ties to their former selves. They were to sell off all of their possessions and bring the money to the cult. However, they were allowed to give certain items to family and friends to remember them by. Then they were required to make a video telling their family and friends good bye for the last time. For they would never see any of them again.

 

It’s Evelyn’s deprogramming that led Lost Children Productions L.L.C. to make this film. In the process though, Lost Children Productions L.L.C learned so much more.

Content is from the site's 2009 -2010 archived pages.

The Lost Children was a cult led by the mysterious and controlling Chance Sturges, and claiming to be made up of aliens from another world, stranded here on Earth for thousands of years.

They were represented by the symbol above, center.

Evelyn's father Alex Hamilton, New York City real estate tycoon and descendant of founding father Alexander Hamilton, hired professional "cult deprogrammer" Jared Allen Tyler to rescue Evelyn from The Lost Children.

We know this story ends in Evelyn's death.

We also know that it involves the passing of the Tioga comet, and alleged UFO sightings within that comet. We know that save for Evelyn and Chance Sturges, the entire Lost Children cult was brutally massacred. We know that Chance Sturges vanished immediately after Evelyn's death. We know that some small groups of women emerged after Evelyn's death, claiming to "believe in" The Alpha.

But no one knows the details leading up to this outcome. It's our goal to collect the rest of this material, in an attempt to tell Evelyn's story in its entirety.

This story should interest those who wonder how one man, a Jim Jones, a David Koresh, a Chance Sturges, can control so many people with little more than the force of their will. It should interest those who wonder at the limits of faith.

It should also interest anyone who has experienced abuse, or been involved in a controlling relationship, or even been involved in a cult, or extreme religious movement.

+++

As a single mom still navigating life after my daughter’s eating-disorder treatment, I’m constantly walking that tightrope between wanting things to feel “normal” again and being terrified of accidentally saying or doing something that might trigger her. My best friend gently suggested that maybe my daughter and I try reconnecting through small, shared moments—something simple like watching a movie together. She recommended The Lost Children, and honestly, I almost said no immediately. The title alone hit me right in that place where all my biggest fears live. For so long, I felt like I was losing my own child to something I couldn’t fight. Just seeing the words “Lost Children” brought back that old panic.

But we watched it anyway. And I’m so glad we did.

The film’s story—this haunting, unsettling look into a cult that pulls people away from their families—struck a nerve in a way I didn’t expect. It’s gripping, beautifully constructed, and deeply emotional. But more importantly, it opened a door for conversations I didn’t even realize my daughter and I needed to have. We talked about vulnerability…about control…about how easy it is for someone to slip into something destructive when they’re hurting or feeling alone. And she talked—really talked—about what recovery feels like, about how afraid she still gets, and about how she wants to keep finding her way back to herself.

It didn’t feel heavy or forced. It felt like connection.

So while the title initially scared me, watching The Lost Children ended up reassuring me in the most unexpected way. It reminded me that my daughter isn’t lost. She’s here. She’s present. She’s healing. And this movie—dark as its themes are—became a bridge that brought us just a little closer again. For that, I’m incredibly grateful. Donna Livak

 

---

---

 

The Hierarchy of The Lost Children

 

 

---

---

 

Who is Chance Sturges?

The following information was compiled from several interviews with people claiming to have grown up with Sturges in Ohio. We are working now, to get these people to commit their recollections to video, but they are reluctant for reasons they will not precisely articulate.

Chance Sturges was born in 1955 in Ohio’s Coshocton county to a harsh, pious minister and a spartan, utilitarian housewife.

Chance grew up working on the farm. His father never gave him much time to play. Chance was expected to be up at dawn to milk the cows, and was not done with his myriad other chores until the sun set. His father was a particularly fiery preacher who believed that the rapture was coming at any moment, so Christians had to be always prepared. Chance’s father wouldn’t really be described as abusive, but he was…strict, even for the time, and he did not spare the rod in disciplining Chance.

When Chance was 8, a traveling circus came through town. And one of the acts was a magician, who went by the name of Oliver Haddo. Chance became obsessed with the tricks Haddo performed, and attended the circus every night it was in town. Until his father found out where he was sneaking off to at night, and put a stop to it with a pretty severe beating. But Haddo claimed to know more than just coin tricks and pulling doves out of his hat. He also claimed to be a medium who could talk to the spirit world. Haddo said that the spirits were all around us all the time. We only had to know how to see them. For some reason this idea intrigued, and then began to obsess Chance. As he went about his chores, he would look for the spirits everywhere, the barn, the fields, the woods on the edge of his father’s property.

Around this time, Chance got the idea that if the spirits were all around us, then they had to come out of people when they died. So if you could see someone at the moment of death, you might actually be able to see their spirit exit their body, get up and hover about. Somehow, Chance reasoned that death must be the moment when you would most likely catch the spirit transitioning from the body into the unseen ether all around us.

So he started to look for opportunities. At church, on Sunday morning, he would keep his eyes glued on the very old, in the hopes that one of them would keel over dead right then and there, and provide him the opportunity he sought. But he had no such luck.

Working in the barn one day, an idea came to him. Was it possible that animals had such spirits as well, as humans? He got a new-born chick and tested his theory. This was a creature whose death he could actively bring about at will. So he did. But there was no spirit forthcoming. There was just a dead chick in his hands.

Chance then reasoned that perhaps animals just did not have spirits to bring forth. Maybe only people had such spirits.

So he again figured that the best chances for catching spirits would be around old people. So at church, one Sunday, he singled out an elderly widow named Clair, whose husband had been burned to death ten years before in a nearby coal mining accident. Young Chance asked his father’s permission to go to the elderly woman, and aid and comfort her in the evenings. Take her food, read to her from the Bible, keep her company. His father was elated at this display of Christian charity from his heretofore quiet and recluse son, and granted Chance permission immediately.

So the father took young Chance to the old woman, and explained that it was entirely the boy’s idea to come and be a comfort to her in the evenings. Never having had children of her own, thus no grand children, the old woman took to the idea with a radiant smile.

Chance went nightly, sat with the woman, read to here from the Bible, as well as some other magazines she had about. But he always watched her out of the corner of his eye, hoping the moment might come when she would pass on right there in his presence. But Chance had no such luck. And he grew impatient. And he started to plan ways to hurry the process along.

Chance went to the old woman one night, and read to her the way he had been doing for weeks. As she sat there dozing in the recliner, Chance took a pillow from the couch he sat on, approached her, and began to smother her with it. Unfortunately for Chance, the old woman was both stronger and louder than she looked. She made a ruckus and the neighbors came running.

Chance was sent away. His father had no understanding of what the boy could have been up to, but it didn’t matter. He would not be able to stay in the community.

Chance was sent to a sanitarium just north of New York City. It was neither good, nor progressive in its understanding of the human psyche, and techniques for curing the mentally ill. It was a Hell.

That is the last time anyone heard from Chance Sturges. There was no record of him ever leaving the sanitarium. There was no record of him dying there. In fact from that point on, there is no further record of his existence at all.

There were rumors. Stories.

For instance there was a story of a man in Zambia, 1976. An American who claimed to live in the jungle, and came into the city to discuss philosophy and religion with a priest at Lusaka’s Cathedral Church. But when 31 people were found to have committed suicide in the jungle outside the city, the stranger was nowhere to be found. There was no record of him entering or leaving the country. Some say this man was Chance Sturges.

Then, there was a half-crazed beach-bum in Santa Monica in the mid-80s. According to Sam Clidesman, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, who knew many of the locals at the time, This bum preached a mish-mash of Biblical fire and brimstone, mixed with UFOs, and giant space spiders coming to Earth to feed. Clidesman never got a name. The bum vanished shortly after a woman accused him of raping her on the beach one night, never to be seen or heard from again.

Now, Chance Sturges is a legend, a wives’ tale. A Boogie-Man. There is no solid proof that the leader of the The Hierarchy of The Lost Children is the same man. Even though this leader preaches via the Internet, no one knows who he really is, or even where he resides.

 

---

---

 

Jared Allen Tyler (Professional Cult Deprogrammer)

Growing up in Brooklyn, NY, Jared was raised primarily by his mother, Sylvia. His father was MIA in Viet Nam.

Jared pursued an academic career, coming up though the New York City Public School System, attending Bronx Science, and eventually attending CUNY, then Columbia for degrees in Psychology. He went back to CUNY to teach.

Jared married Cynthia Chase, another CUNY professor, and the two had a daughter, Jocelyn.

When she was eight, Jocelyn was abducted. Jared and Cynthia’s marriage foundered as Jared became more and more obsessed with finding his daughter. He would leave the house and vanish for days on end, just driving up and down the East Coast searching for her. For two years, there was no word of Jocelyn’s whereabouts. Both Jared’s and Cynthia’s drinking increased, as did the frequency and volatility of their fights. On at least two occasions, neighbors called the police to the house for domestic disturbance.

By the time Jocelyn was found two years later, the couple had separated and Cynthia had died in a car accident, her blood-alcohol level three times the legal limit.

Jocelyn was found when the FBI and ATF stormed the compound of a radical religious sect in rural Pennsylvania. The sect, known as the “Prophets of End of Days” claimed to be preparing for the battle of Armageddon, as foretold in the Book of Revelations. Their leader, known only as “John,” claimed to be the actual author of the Book of Revelations, brought back to Earth to accurately interpret once and for all, what is probably the most controversial and argued over book of the Bible.

The sect’s stockpile included everything from standard sidearms, to grenades to an actual tank hidden under a tarp in the woods behind the compound. The group also had plans for a nuclear weapon, though there is no sign they ever made any progress in constructing such a device.

In an even more bizarre twist to a bizarre story, the compound contained one room, in which five young girls were kept as concubines for “John.” The girls varied in age from 7-12. All five of the girls had been declared missing in the previous two years from areas around the North East.

Three of the girls had defied “John,” and in order to purify their “sinful” natures, he had them chained to a tree outside. All died of malnutrition and exposure, and were buried in the woods about two hundred yards away from the cult compound. One of these girls was Jocelyn.

It was Jocelyn’s fate that drove Jared into his current profession. It started one night at a support group for parents of deceased children. When one of the parents feared her only remaining child might be getting involved with a questionable group, Jared offered to talk to the boy. He went to the house where the group held its meetings. With a baseball bat. He smashed the living room to pieces, but harmed no one. He dragged the boy out of the place by the collar, put him in the car and drove him straight to his mother’s.

 

---

---

 

“T”

“T” lived in Brooklyn, NY at the time he joined THE LOST CHILDREN. We don’t know a whole lot about him at this point, except that this video was recorded in Feb, 2007. And from the background, we guessed that it was recorded in Brookyn’s Prospect Park.

Not many people seemed to know “T.” He had few friends. His parents in Boston, MA had not heard from him since about Halloween, 2006. They were saddened by his loss. But “T”‘s former step-father Richard Cranston(Now divorced from T’s mother) was not surprised:

“I always had a kind of sinking feeling that he would have a bad end. Like a destiny for him. I loved him like he was my own son. But there was always something just a little…off about him.”

“T”‘s mother would not comment.

“T”s body was not found at the site of the LOST CHILDREN MASSACRE, so it’s still unknown if he was part of the group at that time.

 

---

---

 

Anonymous, Poland

Paula Gorski of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, saw this post and wrote us with a basic translation of what the young man is saying. She wasn’t 100% sure of all of it, but here is her translation:

This is going to be short.
I don’t really want to explain.  I don’t think its going to matter to anyone.
Why are I am no longer here.

Nothing happened to me.
This is of my own free will.

(He says something that this is because of his family, grateful to them, for
his earthly form.)

However, I don’t belong to this family, to this country.  I am not a citizen
of Poland or a European citizen.  This is by chance.

I don’t know how you will react to this.
I have a feeling of ……… that this is going in the right direction.

First.  I’ve chosen a new path.  And I do not plan on veering off.
And everyone always said that this is our…[   ]
This is my [   ].
[   ] is an egotistic concept.
It does not bother me.

I will be with my real family now.
Its about time.
I’m glad that they found me.

Otherwise I would continue to be lost.
(sentence I can’t understand)
I would have a life, a son, a daughter, a house, a paid-off apartment.  Who knows.

I always knew.  There had to be a different formula for life.

We are adult children.  I have to raise (raise in terms of raising a child) myself before I can raise anyone else.
I’ve lucked out and will take advantage of the opportunity.
For me this is very vital,(swear word-does not translate) vital.

Everything that is here keys, wallet.
Everything will be left in the closet, outside.
Whoever wants can come here.
Tomorrow I will not be here.
And, that’s everything.
I will be with my family.

(he mubbles two statements here that I can’t understand)

Good Life.

So we think the evidence is pretty strong here that this is indeed one of THE LOST CHILDREN. Many of the phrases he uses are very similar to phrases from others who joined the group. This is a major find, evidence that Sturges’ reach was global.

Original Post

This video was sent in by a woman in Queens, NY. She didn’t say where she got it, but claims it is her cousin in Wroclaw, Poland. She doesn’t know when the video was made, but says her cousin disappeared in Late 2007. He sold or gave away everything he owned, and just vanished. There was a police investigation, but the young man was never found. The young woman asked us not to reveal her name or her cousin’s name. When she heard about our project, she gave us the tape in the hope that it might somehow help us locate her cousin. We’ve committed to sharing with her whatever we learn from the tape. Since she was adopted at an early age by an American family and grew up here, she understands no Polish. So we’re working now to get someone to translate this for us, so that we can confirm that this is indeed one of THE LOST CHILDREN.

So far, we’ve had no evidence that THE LOST CHILDREN group was comprised of anyone outside of the USA, though it’s really no surprise, given that Sturges was known for using the Web to communicate with followers, and also given the fact that allegedly in one of his past incarnations, he operated on the African continent.

 

---

---

 

“G”

“G’s” family has asked us not to reveal too many personal details about her. But they’ve allowed us to tell some generalities, and use materials related to THE LOST CHILDREN in the hopes that her experience might instruct others about the dangers of destructive cults.

“G” recorded this video in Killeen, Tx, though that is not where she’s from. We’re not sure why she was there, unless it was part of her recruitment into the group. It seems that THE LOST CHILDREN conducted recruitment “tours” throughout the country. But unlike some other groups such as Jim Jones’ Peoples’ Temple, these recruitment tours were not in any way publicized. And the locations in each city appeared to be chosen specifically for their low profile. For instance, we know that Evelyn Hamilton was recruited in a tiny tenement apartment on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Nothing about the building indicated that the group had set up shop there. The building was run down and filthy. But according to Evelyn’s friend Julie, who went with her that day but did NOT join the group, the actual apartment where the recruitment took place was spotless and devoid of any furniture save a single small television on a milk crate. This television played a video allegedly from Chance Sturges. We do not know the specific location in Killeen were “G” was recruited, if that was her purpose there.

“G” was by all accounts a normal young woman. She had just started her first year as a gradeschool teacher. She was engaged to be married. She was a Christian and regular church-going person. Absolutely nothing in her life or past would lead anyone to believe she would drop everything and join a group like THE LOST CHILDREN.

But so far as we know, this is often how it is with members of THE LOST CHILDREN. One of the notable things about this group in particular is the seemingly instant transformation of its members. Either that, or the uncanny ability of its members to keep secret their involvement with the group until full commitment.

Like all others, “G” liquidated her possessions and took all of her money with her when she joined. It’s common for leaders like Sturges to require this of members. For this reason, cults often pursue people of means. But not so in the case of THE LOST CHILDREN. The members spanned all economic levels.

“G” was among those murdered in THE LOST CHILDREN massacre.

 

---

---

 

The Father and The Alpha

One of the beliefs of Hierarchy of The Lost Children, was that there are various levels of consciousness. Members strove to higher and higher levels through meditation and spiritual exercises. But another core belief is that one level is innate in a single person; the level of The Alpha. It seems that Evelyn Hamilton, daughter of New York Real Estate mogul Alex Hamilton, had been chosen as this "Alpha". She was chosen by "The Father", Chance Sturges. The Father and The Alpha seemed to share some kind of special relationship not allowed to the other members. This relationship was at least partially sexual in nature, and certainly abusive. According to The Lost Children, there was only one Father, and only one Alpha.

Almost nothing is known about Chance Sturges beyond the age of 9 when he was sent to a sanitarium in upstate New York, because his parents worried about his growing fascination with death. This fascination led him to attempt to smother an old woman. There is no record of Sturges ever leaving the sanitarium, and nothing concrete about him since.

In the 70s, a man who may have been Sturges led a kind of new age group in the jungles outside Lusaka, Zambia. That group committed mass suicide.

In the 80s, a homeless preacher in Santa Monica, Ca, USA may or may not have been Sturges. Some of the preacher's sermons bore similarities to some mythologies in The Lost Children.

 

---

---

More Background On TheLostChildrenMovie.com

 

TheLostChildrenMovie.com is the official online hub for The Lost Children, an independent feature film and transmedia storytelling project created by filmmaker and interactive media designer Mark Harris. The site functions as a hybrid: part film-promotion platform, part fictional archival dossier, and part world-building device for a dark, unsettling narrative about a New Age cult called The Hierarchy of The Lost Children.

What makes this website exceptional is its immersive approach to storytelling. Instead of presenting a conventional film website with trailers, cast listings, reviews, or press kits, TheLostChildrenMovie.com adopts the style of a case file, walking the visitor through the group’s theology, its recruitment practices, testimonies from members, psychological profiles of its leadership, and the tragic events leading to its destruction. This makes the site a central narrative artifact in the broader storyworld — not simply a place to “learn about a movie,” but a place where the viewer is treated as an investigator, piecing together a mystery from existing evidence.

This article provides an in-depth, research-driven exploration of the website, the film project behind it, and the cultural significance of its innovative approach.

---

Understanding the Project: Film, Website, and Transmedia Vision

Though the website reads like a nonfiction exposé, The Lost Children is a scripted narrative film written and directed by Mark Harris, a filmmaker known for blending traditional cinema with interactive media and immersive storytelling formats. Information available through film festival listings, director interviews, and professional profiles indicates that Harris designed The Lost Children as a multiplatform narrative, combining:

• A feature film

• A network of fictional online documents

• Character profiles and video monologues

• Live immersive performances (at events such as FilmGate Interactive and Film Society of Lincoln Center programs)

TheLostChildrenMovie.com is the narrative nucleus: the place that presents the story not from the perspective of marketing, but from the perspective of evidence, as if investigators or family members were trying to understand what happened inside the cult.

This method ties the project to a tradition of immersive transmedia storytelling, a lineage that includes The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield, and more recently Archive 81 and Limetown. But The Lost Children distinguishes itself by approaching the subject with the tone of a cult-recovery documentary rather than a monster or paranormal thriller.

---

The Fictional Narrative Presented on the Website

A Cult Hidden in Plain Sight

TheLostChildrenMovie.com lays out the internal structure, doctrines, and psychological landscape of a New Age movement known as The Hierarchy of The Lost Children.
Within the narrative, this group claims not to be human at all — but extraterrestrials stranded on Earth who must “awaken” to their true identities.

The belief system is built on layered hierarchy:

• The Father (Chance Sturges) – the visionary leader

• The Alpha (Evelyn Hamilton) – a singular chosen figure

• Archangels – top-tier managers implementing doctrine

• Principals – mid-level functionaries

• Angels – recruiters trained to identify potential new initiates

• Sleepwalkers – people on the brink of being “awakened”

• The Gray Force – the spiritually blind majority of humanity

The ideological structure is intentionally reminiscent of cults such as Heaven’s Gate, the People’s Temple, and Koresh’s Branch Davidians. The site’s prose makes use of familiar cult recruitment concepts — the promise of transcendent identity, separation from family, esoteric hierarchy, and emotional dependency on the leader.

The website’s materials assert that members had to abandon all earthly ties, liquidate possessions, surrender personal autonomy, and record farewell videos to family members before “ascending.”

---

Central Figures: The Father, The Alpha, and a Cult Destroyed

Evelyn Hamilton — The Alpha

The site presents Evelyn as the daughter of a wealthy New York real estate mogul, a descendant of Alexander Hamilton, who abandons her privileged life to follow the group’s leader. Evelyn is said to become “The Alpha,” a position of spiritual elevation and symbolic importance.

Her story functions as the emotional core of the narrative: she is not just a victim of a cult but the focus of the film’s mystery.

Her death — tragic, shrouded in secrecy, and linked to the final days of the cult — is the primary narrative question that the film and website attempt to reconstruct.

Chance Sturges — The Father

The site provides an unnervingly detailed biography of Chance Sturges, portraying him as a troubled child from a strict religious household in rural Ohio. His early life includes:

• An obsessive desire to witness the moment of death

• A failed attempt to smother an elderly woman

• Institutionalization at a New York sanitarium

• A disappearance from public record

• Rumors of involvement in mass suicide events abroad

• Reappearances as a UFO-themed street preacher in California

• A mysterious resurfacing as leader of The Lost Children

These elements position Sturges as a charismatic, deeply disturbed figure whose personal mythology mirrors well-documented patterns among real-world cult leaders.

The Massacre and Its Aftermath

One of the most compelling elements of the website is the way it alludes to a catastrophic ending:

• The entire cult is massacred in a violent event.

• Only Evelyn and Chance are believed to survive.

• Evelyn dies shortly afterward under unclear circumstances.

• Chance disappears entirely.

Much of the website’s narrative — and the film’s premise — revolves around piecing together how this tragedy unfolded.

---

Member Testimonies: Videos and “Recovered Material”

A major portion of the site consists of supposed “found footage” and recovered testimonies from members before they disappeared. These include:

• A young man recorded in Prospect Park before vanishing

• A Polish youth filming a farewell video before leaving his life behind

• A schoolteacher named “G” who abandoned her career and fiancé

These stories, presented without traditional movie framing, create the illusion of an investigative archive rather than a promotional website.

---

Website Design, Atmosphere, and Tone

A Case File, Not a Marketing Page

Unlike standard film websites, TheLostChildrenMovie.com feels like a digital dossier. Its design choices intentionally mimic:

• Missing persons archives

• Cold-case reports

• Survivor forums

• Investigative journalism exposés

This framing supports the film’s central theme: how charismatic leaders manipulate vulnerable people into abandoning their identities.

Immersion Through Ambiguity

One of the site’s strongest storytelling techniques is the decision to never quite “break” character. It doesn’t remind viewers they are interacting with fiction. Instead, everything is written in a sober, documentary style — making the site feel eerily plausible.

This blurring of fiction and nonfiction is a defining quality of effective transmedia horror and psychological thrillers.

---

Broader Project Context: Screenings and Festival Activity

Outside the website, public records show that The Lost Children has been presented at:

• FilmGate Interactive (Miami) – an immersive interactive festival

• Film Society of Lincoln Center (New York) – where the project was showcased as part of a transmedia exhibition

• Additional independent film events, new media showcases, and interactive storytelling residencies

Mark Harris is also cited in professional bios as a speaker and instructor in interactive narrative design, reinforcing the project’s position at the intersection of film, media art, and immersive performance.

The film is often described in festival catalogs as:

• A hybrid psychological thriller

• A cult-mystery narrative

• A multi-platform participatory project

This aligns with the website’s design and tone.

---

Cultural Significance and Thematic Impact

A Deep Dive into Cult Psychology

TheLostChildrenMovie.com serves as more than a marketing tool. It is a commentary on:

• How cults recruit

• How they fracture families

• How charismatic leaders exert control

• How belief systems become dangerous

• How vulnerable people are drawn toward promised transcendence

By allowing viewers to explore these dynamics through “primary sources,” the site creates a nuanced picture of coercive persuasion.

A Reflection on Internet-Age Recruitment

The project also explores how cults and extremist groups recruit through digital channels.
Chance Sturges, for example, is said to preach via the internet — mirroring real-world cases where online radicalization replaces face-to-face indoctrination.

Connections to True Crime and Documentaries

The aesthetic intentionally evokes documentaries like:

• Going Clear

• Wild Wild Country

• Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults

By collapsing the distance between fiction and documentary form, the website positions itself within contemporary fascination with cult psychology and true-crime storytelling.

---

Audience, Reach, and Popularity

Though a niche project, The Lost Children has developed an audience among:

• Independent film enthusiasts

• Fans of psychological thrillers

• Followers of cult documentaries

• Immersive-theater communities

• Transmedia storytelling practitioners

• New media academics studying digital narrative

The site has been referenced in:

• Festival programs

• Director biographies

• Interactive storytelling courses

• Fan discussions about cult-fiction media

Visitors often praise the website’s atmosphere, calling it:

• “Convincingly real”

• “Deeply unsettling”

• “A brilliant example of world-building”

• “An immersive storytelling masterclass”

---

Location and Setting Within the Story

The narrative anchors itself primarily in:

• New York City – where Evelyn Hamilton is from, and where parts of the cult operated

• Rural Pennsylvania – a fictional parallel to real-world standoffs such as Waco

• Prospect Park, Killeen (TX), and Poland – locations referenced in member testimonies

• Unspecified hideouts used for recruitment

These geographic locations add texture and realism to the fictional account.

---

Press, Media Coverage, and Professional Context

While TheLostChildrenMovie.com does not directly link to reviews or press, external confirmations show the project’s visibility:

• Festival screenings and program listings

• Interviews with director Mark Harris directed at his work in interactive narrative design

• Mentions in new-media research circles

• Appearances in professional bios for Harris’ work at the intersections of software design and storytelling

Because the project blurs fact and fiction, it often receives attention not as a “movie promotion” but as an example of immersive digital narrative — a form increasingly studied in film programs and media schools.

---

Overall Evaluation: Why TheLostChildrenMovie.com Matters

TheLostChildrenMovie.com stands out because it:

• Extends the film’s story beyond the screen

• Deepens the viewer’s connection to the characters

• Simulates the investigative appeal of true-crime documentaries

• Embeds the narrative in multiple formats (video, text, faux archives)

• Demonstrates sophisticated world-building

• Functions as an emotional and psychological primer for the film

It is a rare example of a website being not merely a companion to a film, but an actual storytelling device used to shape audience perception before they watch the movie.

 

 

---

---