The gloomy house
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The gloomy house |
| Original title | Fanatic |
| Country of production | United Kingdom |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1965 |
| length | 96 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 18 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Silvio Narizzano |
| script | Richard Matheson |
| production | Anthony Hinds |
| music | Wilfred Josephs |
| camera | Arthur Ibbetson |
| cut | John Dunsford |
| occupation | |
| |
The Dark House is a 1964 British horror film from the Hammer Films production with the former Hollywood star Tallulah Bankhead in her last film role of a "bigoted and vicious widow". Directed by Silvio Narizzano , the novel Nightmare was written by Anne Blaisdale .
action
The young American Patricia Carroll travels to London to marry her fiancé Alan Glentower. She wants to use the opportunity to pay a visit to the mother of her former fiancé Stephen, who was once killed in a car accident. That Mrs. Trefoile lives in a remote house in an even more remote village and makes a very strange impression on Patricia from the beginning. Above all, her fanatical religiousness seems very strange. Patricia soon realizes that this visit wasn't such a good idea, because in her madness and endless pain of loss, Mrs. Trefoile blames Patricia for Stephen's death. Then Patricia makes the mistake and makes it clear to her near-mother-in-law that she had no intention of marrying Stephen anyway. She has made Mrs. Trefoile her mortal enemy. It also turns out that her ex didn't just have an accident, but committed suicide in his vehicle.
The gloomy house turns out to be a deadly trap with Mrs. Trefoile as a spider in its web. The old woman forces Patricia to go to mass with her the next morning and then keeps the young woman prisoner. She locks them in a room whose window escape route has been blocked with steel beams. In her religious madness, Mrs. Trefoile now begins to want to "cleanse" Patricia's soul of all her sins. Just the fact that the young woman has red - Trefoile: "that is the color of the devil"! - Wearing make-up and clothes gives the old woman in her eyes the right to start a purgatory against Patricia. Trefoile threatens Patricia with scissors and broken glass, and finally with a firearm, and bombarded her with verses from the Bible. Nor does she stop at murder in order to know that her secret is kept. In the cellar, the insane old woman has already built an altar on which she wants to sacrifice Patricia, who has been "purified" after the purgatory, on which she and her son Stephen may be united for ever after her death. With the maid Anna and the mentally underexposed henchman Joseph, Mrs. Trefoile has also found willing helpers. At the last moment Patricia is rescued by her future husband, Alan. Mrs. Trefoile dies from a knife stab in the back, which Anna gave her changing sides.
Production notes
The gloomy house was created in the summer of 1964 at Elstree Studios (studio recordings) and in Letchmore Heath, Hertfordshire (exterior recordings) and was premiered on March 21, 1965 in London. The German premiere took place on July 30, 1965.
The film structures were created by Peter Proud.
Reviews
On April 28, 1965, Variety stated that the film could be well received by fans of cinema fear, praising Narizzano's director as "inventive" and the dialogues as "fresher than most films of this genre". Tallulah Bankhead, according to the film trade journal, would have "numerous opportunities to show diversity - from the licorice raspy threat to crazy lust for murder".
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote in April 1965, "Although uneven in tone, to put it nicely, this piece of extravagance is at least consistently enjoyable".
The New York Times stated that Tallulah Bankhead may be at the top of the cast list, but that "her efforts add little to her record" as an artist.
"Spectacular tragedy from the British horror production Hammer, designed as a pathological study."
The Movie & Video Guide found the film to be “engaging fun, especially for bankhead admirers”.
Halliwell's Film Guide briefly called the film a "boring and overly long grand-guignol (theater)" that even the dead-looking old star Bankhead couldn't save.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kay Less : The film's great personal dictionary , Volume 1, entry Bankhead. Berlin 2001
- ↑ The Monthly Film Bulletin No. 32, April 1965
- ^ The New York Times, May 20, 1965
- ^ The gloomy house in the Lexicon of International Films , accessed on September 15, 2018
- ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 336
- ^ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 334
Web links
- The gloomy house in the Internet Movie Database (English)