{"id":7091,"date":"2013-10-02T04:30:07","date_gmt":"2013-10-02T08:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=7091"},"modified":"2013-10-02T04:30:07","modified_gmt":"2013-10-02T08:30:07","slug":"dvd-old-dark-house-the-1932","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=7091","title":{"rendered":"DVD: Old Dark House, The (1932)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Return to: <\/strong>Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> \/ <\/em>N to O<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Film: Very Good\/ DVD Transfer: Good\/ DVD Extras: Excellent<\/p>\n

Label: KINO<\/a>\/ Region: 1 (NTSC) \/\u00a0Released: September 2, 2003<\/p>\n

Genre: Mystery \/ Haunted House<\/p>\n

Synopsis: \u00a0While waiting out a torrential storm, strangers quickly discover their hosts are no so benign…<\/p>\n

Special Features: Audiio Commentary #1: James Whale biographer James Curtis \/ Audiio Commentary #2: Actress Gloria Stuart \/ Interview with director Curtis Harrington \/ Stills Gallery with music<\/p>\n

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Review:<\/p>\n

Poorly received when released in 1932, James Whale\u2019s adaptation of J.B. Priestley\u2019s novel vanished from distribution and was considered a lost film, apparently built up to a Holy Grail film not unlike Tod Browning\u2019s London After Midnight<\/a><\/strong> (1927). It took the determined sleuthing of director Curtis Harrington (Night Tide<\/strong>, Queen of Blood<\/strong>, What\u2019s the Matter with Helen?<\/strong>) to track down a surviving negative, housed at Universal\u2019s New York vault, plus the financial assistance of the George Eastman House to mount a restoration before Whale\u2019s film could once again circulate in rep cinemas, and ultimately home video.<\/p>\n

Running a brisk 72 mins., The Old Dark House<\/strong> \u2013 the first of many Priestley works to be adapted for film and TV – is a very strange film that feels like a collection of genres banged together into a new kind of hybrid, and while not a haunted house nor gothic horror film, it could be regarded as a suspense-drama with modernized gothic overtones.<\/p>\n

According to film historian James Curtis<\/a>, who provides a generally consistent commentary track, Benn W. Levy retained much of the dialogue from Priestley\u2019s novel, with Whale adding his own mordant touches to some dry and often vicious repartee between a group of stranded travelers, and the weird family who\u2019ve reluctantly given them shelter and food until an epic storm runs its course.<\/p>\n

Perhaps taking an idea from Jane Eyre, Priestley\u2019s story eventually hovers around a locked room in the nosebleed corner of the mansion where something dark & dangerous lies waiting, and there\u2019s great tension in awaiting the inevitable emergence of Saul, the bad son with a murderous pyro streak who literally forces his family to lock themselves in their rooms, praying he won\u2019t burn down the house.<\/p>\n

Boris Karloff, who gets top billing above Melvyn Douglas, Charles Laughton (in his American film debut), and Raymond Massey (also making his American debut), plays the mute butler \/ attendant with a drinking problem, and Gloria Stuart (in her second film) is the \u2018white flame\u2019 whom Karloff and Saul somewhat fixate when their tempers are unfettered.<\/p>\n

Douglas, Stuart, and Massey are the first lost travelers to arrive at the doorstep of the Femm homestead, which consists of brother Horace (Ernest Thesiger), sister Rebecca (Eva Moore) and butler Morgan (Karloff). During their dinner another couple knocks on the door \u2013 pompous self-made industrialist Sir Willam Porterhouse (Laughton, with a delicious Manchester accent) and his gold digging companion Gladys (Lilian Bond).<\/p>\n

At first the character dynamics keep the guests a little wary of their hosts, but eventually they too splinter into small groups, with a love affair developing between unmarried Penderel (Douglas) and frisky Gladys. According Curtis\u2019 commentary, Whale and writer Levy amped up the dialogue and intensity of the couple\u2019s attraction, but in shirking away the novel\u2019s more quiet tone, the two characters become hugely grating. Their barn romance is hastened and firmed up not with touching and gazing, but exceptionally insipid dialogue, piped out in the most pinched British manner. And being British, Porterhouse\u2019s reaction to losing his rent-a-girl is respectful \u2013 he essentially steps back, and wishes them well, even though he\u2019s not happy to lose his little companion.<\/p>\n

The film\u2019s pre-Code status ensures the dialogue has some spice, and there\u2019s a gratuitous undressing scene where Stuart changes from wet travelling clothes to a shimmering white evening gown. (In her commentary track, Stuart recalls asking Whale the purpose of the wardrobe change: to become a \u2018white flame\u2019 that teases both Morgan the butler and evil Saul into losing their respective cool.)<\/p>\n

Whale\u2019s direction is very interesting in House<\/strong>. The camera moves with elegance, the stylized edits in the post-undressing scene (flash cuts of Rebecca uttering gloomy words) feel very modern, and he treats the house as another character \u2013 a corrupt thing that\u2019s slowly poisoned the minds of its inhabitants.<\/p>\n

Whale retained the same cinematographer and set designer from Frankenstein<\/strong>, giving the film its gothic look, as well as some marvelous visual sequences. (Stuart and Massey\u2019s candle lit ascension to Saul\u2019s room makes great use of perspectives, especially one shot where the camera captures the couple mid-ascent while the dining room flickers in the far off background.)<\/p>\n

The lack of any music score seems like a deliberate choice to fill the soundtrack with exaggerated sound effects, and for a 1932 film, House<\/strong> is a great textbook example on how to craft and shape a sound design where every scene breathes with its own storm of sounds, including wheezing drafts, creaks, and a general hollow ambiance of a hulking old house.<\/p>\n

Curtis notes a particular hallway shot involving blowing curtains that\u2019s likely inspired by Paul Leni\u2019s Cat and the Canary<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>] (1927), and one can also surmise Dario Argento appropriated the moody shot in Suspiria<\/strong> (1977), where a massive old dance studio houses a coven of witches.<\/p>\n

KINO\u2019s DVD uses the same video master as the 1998 Image laserdisc, so while all of the extras (James Whale Filmography excepted) are included, this is a very old transfer that\u2019s been worsened by compression to fit the lot onto a single layer DVD. It\u2019s not a bad transfer, but the lack of detail is akin to an old \u00be\u201d U-matic tape.<\/p>\n

The extras are fine: Stuart\u2019s commentary is a little awkward in the way it was spliced together from a series of replies, whereas Curtis lets a few big gaps interrupt the momentum of his historical narrative. Curtis Harrington\u2019s videotaped interview provides a concise retelling of his friendship with Whale and rescue of the film when Universal lost the rights after William Castle\u2019s 1963 remake for Columbia \u2013 but this is a catalogue title that really needs to be remastered for a contemporary Blu-ray release.<\/p>\n

Whale would reunite with Stuart on The Kiss Before the Mirror <\/strong>(1933), after which the actress (as she laments in her commentary) would grow tired of B-level roles, ultimately stepping away from films in 1946 when her roles became increasingly banal, and Universal wanted to transform the stage-trained actress into a female Tarzan heroine! Stuart’s best-known work to contemporary audiences is the elder Rose in James Cameron Titanic<\/strong> (1997).<\/p>\n

Whale would deliver several more classic genre films \u2013 The Invisible Man<\/strong> (also co-starring Stuart), The Bride of Frankenstein<\/strong> (1935), and Show Boat<\/strong> (1936), The Man in the Iron Mask<\/strong> (1939) \u2013 before being put out to pasture in the 1940s.<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 2013 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

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External References<\/em>:<\/p>\n

IMDB<\/a><\/p>\n

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Vendor Search Links:<\/em><\/p>\n

Amazon.ca<\/a>\"\" \"\" —<\/span> Amazon.com<\/a>\"\" \"\" —<\/span> Amazon.co.uk<\/a>\"\" \"\"—New movie releases on iTunes<\/a>\"\"
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Return to<\/strong>:\u00a0Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> <\/em>\/\u00a0N to O<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Return to: Home \/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews \/ N to O . Film: Very Good\/ DVD Transfer: Good\/ DVD Extras: Excellent Label: KINO\/ Region: 1 (NTSC) \/\u00a0Released: September 2, 2003 Genre: Mystery \/ Haunted House Synopsis: \u00a0While waiting out a torrential storm, strangers quickly discover their hosts are no so benign… Special Features: Audiio Commentary […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[338,2252,2251],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-1Qn","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7091"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7091"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7114,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7091\/revisions\/7114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}