My blogger buddy photog at Orion’s Cold Fire posted last week about his favorite classic horror films, all of which are pre-1960.  It’s a great list, and one of his readers, War Pig, added in some more that go as late as the 1960s.  The black-and-white era was truly a golden age of horror, and many of the films on both lists holds up quite well.

The latest film chronologically on photog’s list is House on Haunted Hill (1959), a William Castle ghost story starring Vincent Price as a wealthy industrialist who offers cash-starved party guests $10,000 each if they can survive the night in the titular spook house.

I just happened to watch House on Haunted Hill last Wednesday night (24 July 2024) on Shudder, and while watching it, stumbled upon photog’s list.  I’ve seen the film before, but it really struck me this time how spooky it is, perfectly setting the tone and feel of a classic, almost Victorian, ghost story.

It also helped that it was a literal “dark and stormy night” while watching it.  The crisp black-and-white cinematography, coupled with the brooding atmosphere, made for perfect ghostly viewing.

The film is a classic of the ghost story genre, and hits upon many of the genre’s tropes:  strangers gathered in a home due to financial necessity; an enigmatic millionaire with his own secrets; a trophy wife of dubious moral fortitude; a young, hysterical woman; and the home’s jittery owner, who sincerely believes the house is haunted.  Throughout, we’re wondering to what extent the events at the House are supernatural in nature, or merely due to human involvement.

Like most William Castle films, original screenings of House on Haunted Hill featured a gimmick, which Castle dubbed “Emergo.”  At a specific scene in the film, some movie theaters would operate an elaborate pully system, which would have a plastic skeleton fly out into the theater, presumably shocking and terrifying the young audiences of the late 1950s.  The gimmick worked, and it made the low-budget flick a box office success, earning a tenfold return on investment.

Even without the gimmick—I suppose I could rig up a flying skeleton in my den—the film holds up as a tightly crafted and fun ghost story.  The characters are a tad one-dimensional, but the story is more about how those characters move the plot along than the characters themselves.  We know they are all motivated by money, but some have better reasons than others for needing that money, such as Nora, the woman working for one of the millionaire’s companies who is supporting her ailing family through her wages alone (others are just washed-up losers with gambling debts).

House on Haunted Hill is more of a murder mystery than a proper ghost story, and it contains elements of both genres.  Its plot is most akin to And Then There Were None, the classic Agatha Christie mystery novel about ten party guests slowly dying off to an unseen murderer.  There’s an easy-to-see twist, and the floating skeleton is not all it appears to be.  There’s also a vat of acid in the basement for no plausible reason, other than, well, this house is a creepy place, so why not?

As hokey as it all sounds—and it is a bit hokey—the film is great fun.  You, too, should watch it the next time you’re at home on a dark and stormy night.

It’s also in the public domain—you can literally watch it on Wikipedia, if you really want to do so—and there are several versions on YouTube.