It's quite eye-opening when you realize the classics aren't always so revered by a highly vocal majority. In fact, scan the IMDb user comments and you'll see that plenty throw up the cursed 1/10 so easily wondering why folks like me overrate it.
Perhaps it is as they say dated, maybe too old fashioned. Maybe the audience of 1963 or before it saw much more in Wise's epic B&W haunted house spectacle than the generations after 1990 or after. A 1977 disco baby might be, or not in some cases, more susceptible to the film's power, its reach and grasp, its pull and grip.
Maybe the house, the camera sometimes drawn away from a distance or right up on it real close, doesn't spook up any real chills or persuade you to give up yourself to its presence.
I don't personally think this is as dated as others and I like that the film doesn't shy away from the fact Bloom's Theo is lesbian. Maybe it isn't blatant and due to restrictions of the time left for us to read the subtlety. And Harris' Nel being in love with Johnson's Dr. Markway while Theo seems jealous offers updated for 1963 some adult themes often not so welcomed in a form that isn't heightened melodrama. Granted some of the criticism I noticed was that the film is very melodramatic. Maybe Nel is a bit histrionic, prone to bouts of exaggerated nerves, lost in her mind of loud thought.
But for me Wise using his camera style and audio effects with emphasis on pounding and spectral voice and phenomena, it's architectural menace, the visual bending and shifting, the house's personality coming unglued and misbehaving, the statues and wallpaper, banisters and stairs, the chairs and furniture, all aligned and designed by a particular madman....this is what consumes my attention, has a gravitational pull I have no willingness to fight against.
This has been a Halloween month mainstay for many a year. It's a picture most welcome when the sky is cold and grey, as the leaves die and depart from the withering trees in autumn.
Oh and if you are afraid of heights, this will put you to the test, as the spiral staircase trip to the top with a deteriorating Nel climbing it, totally succumbed to the house, with Wise ingeniously darkening out the background where she is only left, telling us she's captured by it, points out how far off the floor she is. And Wise making sure the exterior of the house is always sinister and seemingly aware, the evil of it claims who it can.
Perhaps too much inside Eleanor's head provokes a negative response. Spending this much time in a neurotic's mind might be a bit difficult.
I dunno. Perhaps this film dropped in a weekday on Turner Classics isn't the ideal time for anyone to see it. I admit that a June Saturday evening isn't quite as bewitching as a Thursday in late October.
The quotable dialogue about the house, the digs between Theo and Nel (themselves often sharp and cruel) at each other despite clearly loving one another, Markway's paranormal speeches and debates with non-believing skeptic, Luke (Tamblyn) and the ladies, the macabre children's book, family statues in the greenhouse, and ornamental display in the house all hook me to the film with a ball and chain I remain quite attached. And I like how Wise doesn't wait to get right to it: almost upon arrival, Theo and Nel experience the house's ghostly activity. And I must never forget the Dudleys, the snarky caretaker and grim housekeeper who always talks about leaving before night comes.
And Wise takes us all throughout the house...we really get a travelogue of it. And he makes damn sure we feel what Nel does. 5/5
My final remarks do sort of correspond and might even repeats past comments but I wanted to really dig in deep one last time and honor the film. What others do not seem to see or understand I join the other crowd who believes its reputation is not only deserved but preserved.
An evil old house, the kind some people call haunted, is like an undiscovered country waiting to be explored. Hill House had stood for 90 years and might stand for 90 more. Silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there... walked alone.
Hill House has stood for 90 years and might stand for 90 more. Within, walls continue upright, bricks meet, floors are firm, and doors are sensibly shut. Silence lies steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House. And we who walk here... walk alone.
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