The Haunting
Short description
The Haunting follows a group of people invited to spend time at Hill House, an isolated New England mansion with a long history of violent death and madness. Dr. John Markway, a researcher into the paranormal, assembles the party not simply for a study of sleep disorders but to test whether the house is genuinely haunted. Among those who join him are Eleanor Lance, a shy woman with a troubled past and a sensitivity to psychic phenomena; Theodora, a medium; and Luke Sanderson, a young man connected to the property's ownership. As the nights pass, strange noises and mounting unease suggest the mansion may be answering Eleanor in particular.
The film was directed and produced by Robert Wise, the eighth of the thirteen features he directed, arriving between West Side Story and The Sound of Music. Nelson Gidding wrote the screenplay, and the cast is led by Julie Harris, Claire Bloom, Richard Johnson and Russ Tamblyn, with Fay Compton and Rosalie Crutchley in supporting roles. Made for about one million dollars, it returned roughly three million worldwide. Audience opinion is solid rather than overwhelming: on IMDb it holds 7.4 out of 10 from around 46,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.1 from a much smaller pool. Critics have rated it higher still, at 8.3 from 46 reviews, placing it above the general audience response.
What's left behind the scenes
- The film is based on the novel of the same name by Shirley Jackson (1959).
- After reading Shirley Jackson's novel 'The Haunting of Hill House,' director Robert Wise suggested to a familiar screenwriter, Nelson Gidding, that he adapt the book into a screenplay. Gidding initially felt that, like the acclaimed film 'The Innocents,' all the supernatural events in the book could be explained by the mental disorder of the 'homeless' heroine, obsessed with the idea of her own home. Only a conversation with Shirley Jackson convinced him otherwise.
- Working on the script took six months. Giddings left out most of the mysticism, minimized the number of characters, and moved almost all the action to a 'bad' house. Initially, the film was planned to include a scene of Theodora's emotional breakup with her friend, which would leave no doubt about the former's sexual orientation.
- According to the terms of his expiring contract, Robert Wise was required to film one more movie for MGM studio, which agreed to finance the 'horror' only if its budget did not exceed $1 million. To save on tax deductions, filming took place at the British MGM studio. A condition for receiving a tax break was the involvement of local actors in the filming. Studio executives ordered the toning down of the lesbian subtext in the girls' relationship and forbade the actresses from touching each other on camera.
- In search of a suitable house for filming, Wise requested a list of old mansions from paranormal enthusiasts, where ghosts were rumored to have been seen. He settled on Ettington Hall, a Victorian manor in Warwickshire.
- Actress Julie Harris had long been interested in parapsychology and readily agreed to play the role of Eleanor. During filming, she was in a depressed state and did not get along well with her colleagues, whom she blamed for not taking the project seriously enough. Later it became clear that the actress’s heightened emotional state added extra credibility to the image of Eleanor.
- In 1990, television magnate Ted Turner conceived of colorizing black-and-white films from classic Hollywood to attract a younger audience. Upon learning that 'The Haunting' was included in the colorization plan, Robert Wise, citing the terms of his contract, was able to block the colorization of the film.
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