House on Haunted Hill (1959)

Better Late Then Never

Best movie ever!

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

This was certainly a scary movie for its time. Vincent Price was a great choice for the leading role. The movie in black and white made it intense.

Of course, it's terrible but then what would you expect coming from William Castle. It's also camp fun in a terrible kind of way but again what would you expect from a movie with Vincent Price in the lead and a ham-fisted cast that includes Carol Ohmart, Elisha Cook (at his hammiest) and Alan Marshall. The premiss is simple; a group of people have to spend the night in a haunted house and if they survive they each earn $10,000 and the movie does exactly what it says on the tin, though it's never actually frightening despite ticking all the boxes. Like most Castle films it was perfect drive-in material and actually lead to a much more expensive remake which I have managed to avoid. Terrible then, but tolerable.

The House on Haunted hill was a great picture, this movie was from a generation where Horror was in it's prime. The 20's, 30's,40's, and 50's and some 60's were great horror decades. This movie is from that era.The story goes as follows, a rich man and his wife invite five people to his mansion. But this is not any ordinary mansion, supposedly it's haunted. He invites them for a "Ghost Party" and starting at midnight, whoever survives the night until the morning will win $10,000. At first everyone thinks this guys party is a joke, but then things start to get creepier and out of place. Heads appear, ghost appear, a woman kills herself (or so we think). And the night becomes a living hell for each individual person.The Five Guest 1. A Doctor 2. An old Widowed woman 3. A pilot 4. A young woman who works for the host company 5. A previous owner of the mansion, who knows it's haunted and dangerousAs things play out, we find out that some things have been a scary joke,and and some things have not. Out of these seven people the host and his wife included, three of them play major roles in the nights events. As the movie progressed I knew something was fishy about the whole event, it's not until halfway into the film I found out what was really going on, and I loved how the story play's out. I won't spoil anything then what I have already. Let's just say it's a game of cat and mouse sort of. I loved The House on Haunted Hill, a classic 50's movie that never gets old. 10/10.

They don't make 'em like this anymore. More's the pity, as William Castle's cheap and cheerful little spine-chiller is camp entertainment all the way. The budget is low, but Castle makes the best of his small location by filling it with macabre gags: a bloody severed head in a suitcase, a wraith of an old woman who slides around, a body hanging from a noose. These shocks are all served up in the best, nostalgia-ridden time-honoured tradition, with plenty of shrieks and screams as Castle derives maximum terror from each of the slight supernatural occurrences that he builds up.As an added bonus, horror star Vincent Price is cast in the lead role of Frederick Loren, a demented joker with plenty of tricks up his sleeves. Price is at his campest, jovial best here when talking sinisterly with his "amusing" wife, who has thrown the party. It turns out that his darling has tried to poison him on at least one occasion - but she makes out it's the other way round to a gullible guest (then again, what red-blooded male wouldn't fall for her charms?). The role seems to have been written for Price, either that or he just naturally fits it like a glove, and I really couldn't imagine any other actor in the role.Fleshing out the cast are Carol Ohmart as the lovely but devious wife, Alan Marshal as a stern doctor who hides some terrible secrets, and Richard Long as the young dashing hero. Only Long comes off badly - but his role is a poorly-written one, with much time taken up with indecision and a lack of action. Elisha Cook Jr. (who appeared again with Price in Corman's THE HAUNTED PALACE) enjoys himself as a spaced-out drunk who regales us with stories of murder and death, and it's a role he would essentially play in most of his latter-day films. The casting directors duly noted: if you needed an old-time and comical drunk, Elisha Cook was your man.Okay, so the direction is strictly by the book and the plot rather simplistic, but Castle concentrated here on the gimmicks of which he was so fond - this was the film where his infamous 'Emergo' came into play (a rubber glow-in-the-dark skeleton sailed past cinema-goers at a vital moment in the action). The opening of the film is a spooky masterpiece - disembodied heads introduce the cast and tell tall stories while screams and chains rattle in the darkness. And the best effect of all is saved until the end, where a woman is attacked by a ghostly skeleton which pushes her into an acid bath! It all turns out to be Price's work, as he's rigged up the skeleton as a puppet - although you're required to suspend disbelief in his fantastic mechanism. This skeleton moment is the highlight of a richly entertaining film, delightfully old-fashioned and catered for the kid in all of us. A remake followed in 1999 but obviously there's no substitute for Castle or Price. Just sit back, dim the lights and enjoy!