The unquiet dead
This is one that really dates me, takes me back to the days of Fear on Friday (remember that, anyone? 
) in fact but, what makes John Hough‘s The Legend of Hell House (1973) so stick in my memory was that it was one of the first late-night horrors that I saw as a teen that seemed to have something more to offer than moldering corpses, heaving breasts and stakes through the heart – in short, it was my first truly ‘grown-up’ ghost story, hence why revisiting it (as I did just the other day) is such a pleasure.
As I was to grow into fully fledged appreciation, in fact love, of the horror genre, it came as no surprise to me when I later learned that the film’s screenplay was written by Richard Matheson, from his own novel, Hell House – Matheson, for the uninitiated, is one of the horror/sc-fi/fantasy genre’s true remaining icons, with legendary works to his name such as I Am Legend (but you can forget the 2007 Will Smith travesty), The Shrinking Man, What Dreams May Come and Duel, and it is his obvious understanding of how the horror genre is supposed to work and what it can achieve at its best that elevates this film into a tense, literate and fascinating examination of the supernatural.
Director Hough (Incubus (1982), American Gothic (1988)) gives the narrative a documentary feel from the outset – physicist Dr Lionel Barrett (Clive Revill) has been commissioned by elderly magnate Rudolph Deutsch (Roland Culver) to find ‘the facts’, namely about the possibility of a life after this one. One of the few places on earth where such investigation might yield meaningful results is the mansion formerly belonging to one Emeric Belasco, the ‘roaring giant’ who built it in 1919 and then proceeded to fill it with ‘drug addiction, alcoholism, sadism, beastiality, mutilation, murder, vampirism, necrophilia, cannibalism, not to mention a gamut of sexual goodies’ before disappearing, seemingly off the face of the earth.
And speaking there is physical medium Benjamin Franklin Fischer (an excellent Roddy McDowall), who was the only person to survive the previous attempt to investigate the house in 1953 – eight others were killed, crippled or driven insane by their experiences. Accompanying the two men are Barrett’s wife Ann (Gayle Hunnicutt) and mental medium Florence Tanner (Pamela Franklin). Barrett has brought the two mediums along for an alternative perspective, but he actually believes that the house can be ‘beaten’ by science. Will he be right, do you think?
As is so often the case with the horror genre, the films that take it seriously are those that succeed, and Matheson’s tight, literate script, combined with fine characterizations from the cast (particularly McDowall’s jangly, nerve-jangling interpretation) are what makes this work so well.
And its denouement, which involves an excellent, unnerving (and uncredited, heh, heh, heh) cameo from Michael Gough, is a belter. Why not take your own trip down memory lane, just make sure you turn the lights out. Watch The Legend of Hell House for yourself here.
95 mins.
This was a staple of English broadcaster ITV horror seasons for many years, similar to Fear on Friday, where a horror from the seventies would be shown after News At Ten, and this is where I first encountered this often overlooked gem. Hell House worked for me because it didn’t rely on gallons of gore and blood to make it work, but it worked more on a psychological level as you never knew what evil lurked behind the door (in one case a deranged cat, funny now as it looks like a stuffed toy, but absolutely terrifying when you’re a kid). Having purchased the DVD, The Legend of Hell House still holds up well as a psychological horror mainly through a tiny but excellent cast and haunting music by the woman who composed the theme music to Doctor Who.
Dear Glenn,
An enormous pleasure to read your comment, welcome to Picturenose!
Yes indeed, those were the days – as you are obviously among the privileged few who remember Fear on Friday, please do check out my appreciation of it here – http://www.picturenose.com/tag/fear-on-friday?mobile=1.
And I very much agree with you concerning Matheson’s adaptation of his own novel (have you read it? I only ordered it from Amazon the other day, to read it myself for the first time), which I think transfers the narrative very well from the US to Blighty. This was a time when the horror genre was still being taken seriously, and, along with Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963), the film is an excellent example of the subtle, chilling ghost yarn. Be great to hear more from you, thanks again.
James,
The novel is far more explicit than the film, which had an AA (over 14s only) certificate when released in Britain, and explains Berlasco’s pervy behaviour in far more detail. I would consider getting a copy, as this is yang to the film’s ying.
The Legend of Hell House also was one of the last great British horrors, as we seemed to move away from the genre after 1973. I’ll also check out your review of Fear on Friday, as this was a popular feature (often called Horror Night) in England during the 1980s.
Glenn,
Fascinating, I had no idea that there were ‘alternative’ Fear on Friday slots around the country with different names, is this true? And yes, I have heard that the novel is far more graphic – according to Stephen King, whose work I have followed all my life, it is the scariest haunted house novel, bar none. I assume the gist of the twist is still the same? On second thoughts, don’t tell me…
ITV in the 1980s operated on a regional basis and films were moved around the regions. I do recall seeing Hell House on Central on a Wednesday night in 1990. However, Border tended to shut at 11.00 until 1986, unless there was a big movie premiere, so we didn’t get our version of Fear on Friday until then. Mind you, Tyne Tees was a far bigger station than Border, so could afford to stay on air longer.