The concept of the film pays homage to the likes of Stir of Echoes and a horror short story written by W. W. Jacobs and originally published in 1902 called The Monkey’s Paw .
The promise of three stories—and multiple visitations—echoes Dickens’s A Christmas Carol , and the three wishes the genie grants Aladdin in The Thief of Bagdad , and even the three wishes in “The Monkey’s Paw.”