Synopsis per iMDB: A millionaire offers $10,000 to five people who agree to be locked in a large, spooky, rented house overnight with him and his wife.
My Notes: When I was like 10 or 11, I used to have a mixed cassette of Halloween sounds. There were moans and screams, cats and howling, crashes and groaning. – I swear, the opening scene with the groan… that was most definitely one of those tracks on the cassette!!
“There will be food and drink and ghosts and you’re all invited.” Price is just an amazing narrator.
In the credits I see that one man did the men’s wardrobes and one woman did all the women’s. That just jumped out at me.
After all of the introductions, and they are standing around in the reception room, I cannot help but wonder if during the olden days of Hollywood, if all of their faces just looked so perfect. Like, no blemishes, no marks – just flawless skin.
I loved the wicked couple, one outdoing the other and taking the “married till death do you part” to the next level! Arsenic on the rocks indeed!
I enjoyed it. I enjoyed how it sounded, if that makes sense. The old movies with their sound editing are just a joy to rewatch. This is my first movie of the spooky season!
Those are my thoughts on the show and now for a little trivia.
Directed by: William Castle
Writing Credits: Robb White
Cast (in credits order)
Vincent Price as Frederick Loren
Carol Ohmart as Annabelle Loren
Richard Long as Lance Schroeder
Alan Marshal as Dr. David Trent
Carolyn Craig as Nora Manning
Elisha Cook Jr. as Watson Pritchard
Julie Mitchum as Ruth Bridges
Leona Anderson as Mrs. Slydes
Howard Hoffman as Jonas
Skeleton as Himself
Trivia:
Exterior shots of the haunted house, primarily during the opening sequence, were filmed at The Ennis Brown House, located in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles. Designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and built in 1924, it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The skeleton that rises from the vat of acid is a real human skeleton. Like most movies, it was simply faster and cheaper to buy a real human skeleton from a biological supply house than having one created by the special effects department.
The failure of the original copyright holder to renew the film’s copyright resulted in it falling into public domain, meaning that virtually anyone could duplicate and sell a VHS/DVD copy of the film. Therefore, many of the versions of this film available on the market are either severely (and usually badly) edited and/or of extremely poor quality, having been duped from second- or third-generation (or more) copies of the film.
Julie Mitchum (sister of Robert Mitchum) was wearing a large Bahá’i ring on the set. The director noticed this and thought it would add a slight bit of mystery to her character, so he arranged one shot with an extreme close-up of the ring. The inscription on the stone is Arabic calligraphy that translates as “God is most glorious”.
Nora Manning is the only one to see ghosts throughout the movie.
Thoughts and Ponderances 