William Castle Week

The Old Dark House (1963) is played entirely for the amusement of the audience of the time. Problem is I'm not sure it translates as well to an audience of any decade after the 60s. You can watch this and not wonder why Castle wasn't trusted with "Rosemary's Baby". Still I love Castle and though this isn't a patch on Whale's classic film in 1932, I never felt it was intended to be. Castle wanted the film to be fun.

What do I like about it?

✓ The house is quite the crumbling, leaking, decaying relic of an old family

✓ a homicidal maniac is bumping off their family one at a time

✓ again the killer is designed to be right the opposite of expectations, a Castle staple

✓ Mervyn Johns, an icon to me thanks to "A Christmas Carol" and "Dead at Night", builds an ark preparing for an apocalyptic flood during a heavy rain.

✓ Morley, with his gun collection, is a delightfully animated ham.

✓ Poston of "Newhart" fame averting one calamity during a long stormy night as the Femm family is being bumped off 

✓ heart is in the right place

Current rating: ***/*****