Shadows on the Stairs

"Strangers in the night... exchanging glances... Wond'ring up and down... the stairs of Mrs Armitage's Lodgings... Repeatedly, in the dark... being all shifty and stuff..." What was I saying again? Oh yes, it's the 1941 mystery, SHADOWS ON THE STAIRS.

Welcome to 1930s London, where Mrs Armitage's guesthouse is seeing a lot of action - whether it's the various romantic trysts going on amongst the lodgers, the shady smuggling operation overseen by Indian resident, Ram Singh, or the fact that dead bodies are starting to turn up left, right and centre. It's a rum do, alright, and I wouldn't be surprised if it takes longer than the standard sixty minutes to sort out, especially if there's some sort of plot twist to factor in too...

Sadly, all of the elements that make up Shadows on the Stairs sound a bit more interesting in concept than they do when dashed into the mix here. While characters a-plenty boast quirks a-plenty, no one manages to emerge as an interesting protagonist and, in fact, there's a tendency for the more irritating characters to sidle centre-stage, including Mrs Armitage herself (Frieda Inescort), her daughter Sylvia (Heather Angel) and, as the whodunit comes to the fore, a truly annoying, stiff upper-lipped police constable (Charles Irwin).

That's not to suggest the acting is any worse than your standard Old Dark House movie. There's definitely some amusement to be found amongst the performers, who play their stereotypical old maids, dull husbands and roguish foreigners to the hilt. Character actor Turhan Bey, whose Turkish heritage led to his casting in a range of interesting roles, got his first proper credit here, and Mary Field more-or-less steals the film as the awkward Miss Snell, who's never more than a moment away from recounting the entire plot of her latest library book in dangerous detail. 

The English backdrop is convincing enough to give this the feel of a British production (it's not - it was filmed in Hollywood by Warner Bros.) but the initially befuddling plot doesn't ease you into its world. Similarly, the climactic reveal has a certain degree of charm, being an earlyish example of a now-familar conceit, but isn't likely to convince you you've invested your time particularly wisely. Ultimately, I'm afraid I just can't recommend this very highly... It's not bad, but plenty of other Old Dark House movies leave it loitering in their shadows.  

RATING: 🕸

Murder by Invitation

Welcome to the Denham Sanity Trial, where the relatives of eccentric Aunt Cassie are hoping the judge will have her committed so that they can get their hands on her $3m estate and house in the mountains... At least, that's the plan - and that's the motive - for a MURDER BY INVITATION!  

I'm a little wary of Wallace Ford. I love The Rogues Tavern but its leading man is absolutely not the best thing about it. Here he is again, as a journalist who smarms his way into the middle of a murder investigation. And, just like in Tavern, it's one of his sidekicks doing the bulk of the detective work... Not that I'm complaining - I'd rather spend time with the sidekick, after all. But does that save the film? I'm afraid I'm going to have to say no. This 1941 flick starts out funny, with enough zingers peppering the aforementioned court case I expected Hepburn and Tracy to pop up, but once we arrive at the Old Dark Greylock House itself, the enjoyment drains away like it's controlled by some kind of faulty fun faucet. And who needs one of those?

Once it's been established that Aunt Cassie (an impish Sarah Padden) is indeed playing with a full set of marbles - in the eyes of the court, at least - her greedy relatives find themselves summoned to Greylock for a midnight meeting. None are keen to make the trip - in fact, several suspect the giggly old bat has murder in mind - but being a no-show means being cut out of her will for definite, so they grudgingly head up into the hills. 

And there we have it. The stage is set for lashings of backwoods backbiting, as Cassie descends the staircase on the stroke of twelve, announcing she's going to study them all for a while and leave her money to "the worthiest of an unworthy lot". It's only a matter of time (1am in the library, to be exact) before one of the gang turns up dead, and the backstabbing descends into actual stabbing. Enter gossip columnist Wallace Ford (he's not even a news reporter) to put an end to the murders, accompanied by his secretary (Marian Marsh), who gets all the funniest lines, and crime scene photographer (Herbert Vigran), who does all the dog work. (Remind me why Ford is in this again?)

In an annoying touch, while the killer is likely to be a member of the family (i.e. someone named in the will), Ford spends most of the time pompously suspecting the servants. There's talk, talk, talk as it emerges that literally everyone has an alibi but, eventually, a secret passage is discovered, leading to an amusing bargain between Aunt Cassie and another character that provides some much-needed relief from all the interrogating. 

Released in the wake of 1939's The Cat and the Canary (which is even name-dropped at one point), Murder by Invitation tries to emulate that film's self-awareness by having Ford spout things like, "This has all the elements of a swell murder mystery!"... Only this time it's not, and the constant reminders don't help. What I will say, however, is that the whodunit angle actually plays out fairly; it's just a shame it's not delivered in a very entertaining way. I rolled a sympathetic eye when Mike the mechanic declared: "If these murders don't stop, I'm never going to get this car greased!"

Enjoy the lively opening credits, which juggle the story's motifs (eyes, clocks and flames) with James Bondian glee, but don't expect too much else from this sub-par effort, which really should have brought more to the table. This ain't the Thirties anymore, Monogram!  

RATING: 🕸

Bulldog Drummond's Secret Police

By Jove! Some rotter's made a dash for the secret treasure of Rockingham Towers! It's upper-class twittery all the way in this 1939 entry in Paramount's gentleman-adventurer series, BULLDOG DRUMMOND'S SECRET POLICE... 

Here's a jolly jape that sneaks onto many Old Dark House movie lists but, to be perfectly honest, is more of a British country house comedy with elements of intrigue. Still, it's an entertaining watch and, as someone who hasn't seen any other Bulldog Drummond films, I'd even say it serves as a good introduction to the series. 

John Howard stars for the sixth time as the dashing toff, Drummond, who's in the midst of wedding preparations at his sprawling estate, Rockingham Towers, where he's due to marry sweetheart Phyllis (Heather Angel) the next day. Cluttering up the supporting cast are an assortment of colonels, constables, maiden aunts and butlers, including Hitchcock fave Leo G. Carroll as a newly-appointed manservant, and Forrester Harvey as a visiting professor. The latter is keen to share his discovery that Rockingham stands atop a network of catacombs containing buried treasure, as recorded in a coded journal he just happens to have brought along. My goodness... what a wheeze it would be if the documents were to fall into the wrong hands, setting off a desperate hunt for both a devious criminal and the legendary fortune itself!    

Operating on the level of a Hardy Boys adventure, B.D.'s S.P. actually does what it does quite well... You just need to be clear what you're signing up for. The plot is simple but pleasingly paced, taking place over the course of an eventful night and morning, with a climactic descent into the subterranean passages providing dungeons, deathtraps and derring-do that plays like The Goonies in smoking jackets. 

The plentiful humour is largely of the Jeeves and Wooster variety, highlighted by E.E. Clive as Drummond's butler, Tennyson, a droll character very much in the Alfred Pennyworth mould ("Pardon me, Sir, but we're in for a spot of trouble," he remarks as a ceiling covered in spikes begins to descend). But, oddly enough, most of it finds the funny bone - even a rickety bit of slapstick involving a Ming vase destined to end up in pieces. I guess even this kind of upper-class twaddle is preferable to the noxious treatment of Black servants you'd likely end up with as the equivalent 'comic relief' in an American-set film. 

Not one for chill-seekers, then, and it'll probably play better to Anglophiles, but a spiffy spot of spoofery to mix up your Old Dark House viewing on a slow day. 

RATING: 🕸🕸

The Cat and the Canary

Originally staged on Broadway in 1922, first filmed as a silent movie in 1927, then again with sound in 1930 (but since lost)... Super-funny and super-scary, it's 1939's THE CAT AND THE CANARY!  

We open on the misty waters of the Louisiana Bayou, as lawyer Crosby (George Zucco) is ferried to his next appointment. "Anyone else living around the old Norman place?" he asks his guide. "Not people," the boatman replies, tracing a portentous circle in the air with his hand. In our first hint of the chills to come, the background music swells into a eerie, drawling squeal...

By the end of the 1930s, the Old Dark House genre had fallen into a predictably silly and largely parodic pattern, but The Cat and the Canary hit the reset button - and hard. Here was a film from Paramount Pictures that stole a sidelong glance at the still-successful horror films of rival studio, Universal, before pouncing over and dragging back a handful of real fear to sprinkle liberally into the Old Dark House formula. Don't let anyone tell you that the humour of The Cat and the Canary outweighs the horror, because this cat has claws! 

The structure follows the classic suspense pattern, later exemplified by Hitchcock, who liked to pace his films around three crescendos, or 'bumps' as he called them. Greasing the wheels of the roller coaster is the comedy - of which there's plenty, and it's plenty funny - provided in the form of witty, fast-paced dialogue. Most of the zingers come from leading man Bob Hope, who, as actor Wally Campbell, is familiar with the mystery genre and even comments on the three-act nature of the nightmare unfolding around him. 

Wally is one of six relatives gathered for the reading of a will at the aforementioned Old Norman Place, now occupied only by former housekeeper Miss Lu (Gale Sondergaard) and her black cat. Needless to say, not all of the relations are going to come away from the meeting satisfied, meaning that, when the sole heir is revealed (in this case, Paulette Goddard) several others will be left with a motive for murder.

Adding to the atmosphere of peril is the news that a dangerous maniac nicknamed 'The Cat' has escaped from a local asylum and may be prowling the area... In fact, it's a glimpse of this frightening villain that provides the first big 'bump' at the end of the film's first act. This is a masterful scene - one of my favourites in all of Old Dark House horror - in which Paulette Goddard, reading The Psychology of Fear in a darkened room, senses she's not alone. As the audience, we know full well she's not, having seen a secret panel behind her slide silently open and a claw-like hand appear. Most scare scenes involve either sustained low-level tension (the 'anticipation' before a jolt, say) or full-on suspense (a threat hurtling ever closer) but this isn't quite either. On the surface, it's simplicity itself - nothing really happens - yet the way it works, escalating towards a feeling of utter panic as Goddard bolts for the door, makes it one of the best-constructed scares in classic horror.   

Bump #2, arriving at the end of the second act, involves the surprise discovery of a body and is again innovative, with the corpse falling towards and yet past the camera. (There's an 'impossible' shot of a body seen 'through' the floor in Robert Zemeckis's What Lies Beneath that always reminds me of this.) And, finally, the story's tortuously extended chase climax provides the ultimate crescendo, pulling no punches whatsoever and featuring a killer with an absolutely massive knife.  

Production values are off the chart, with sets and lighting creating an almost three-dimensional space - a distorted funhouse characterized by contradictions: towering ceilings and confined corners; elegance and decay. The longer the characters reside within its walls, the more they too warp into untrustworthy ciphers. In the small number of scenes set beyond the confines of the manor, we discover a tangled, expressionistic jungle that's even more dangerous, and it's here that, naturally, the terrific climax occurs. 

The Cat and the Canary is iconic - one of those delicate alignments of fate that results in a sweet perfection. Unusually, the studio was able to repeat the trick the following year, gathering many of the major players and reshuffling them into the more overtly supernatural The Ghost Breakers. I only wish they'd tried for a hat trick, but the fact that the lightning struck twice thankfully left us with a couplet of quintessential scare-comedies. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸🕸🕸

Son of Ingagi

TO LET: Unique property at 1313 Wellman Road. Includes hidden laboratory, lurking monster. Perfect starter home for defenceless couple... It's a fixer-upper alright but there's a solid structure beneath 1940's SON OF INGAGI...

Most modern audiences approaching Son of Ingagi will know it's widely considered to be the first Black horror movie, having been penned by African-American 'race film'-maker Spencer Williams and performed by an all-Black cast. Cinema historian Tananarive Due considers its genre secondary to the film's purpose, arguing that it was "really meant to confront so many negative stereotypes about black people in cinema but using horror, which was a very popular genre, to present us just being ourselves". While this is true, the film still notches up what feel like a couple of horror firsts, making it possibly even more of a landmark than its reputation suggests.

Newlyweds Eleanor and Robert Lindsay (Daisy Bufford and Alfred Grant) have inherited a big old house that once belonged to Dr Jackson, a woman thought of as the local witch. The Lindsays always liked her but, thanks to her mysterious death, they now find themselves facing all kinds of strange occurrences in her old home. It turns out the doctor had a skeleton in her closet... or, more accurately, a 'wild man' from Africa in her basement lab. And just before he killed her, he'd imbibed a secret formula that not only apparently drove him into a murderous rage but also imbued him with superhuman strength! Let's hope comedy cop Detective Nelson (played by writer Williams) can sort things out and prevent more deaths - or at least keep track of his disappearing sandwiches... Priorities, man!

1974 was the big year for 'hider in the house' horror, finding a voyeuristic killer occupying a secret room in the TV movie Bad Ronald and calls coming from inside the house! in the early slasher Black Christmas. It continues to impress me, then, that Son of Ingagi was playing with this notion so effectively four decades earlier, and I can't think of an earlier example of the trope. 

Where later films have played up the killer's ingenuity and twistedness, Ingagi keeps it fairly simple: its bogeyman, named N'Gina, awakens whenever a gong is struck and leaves his lair to prowl the house. With race films simultaneously ahead of the curve in terms of representation, but possibly playing catch-up in other respects, he comes across as something like the child of Universal's Frankenstein monster from nearly ten years prior: brutal and fierce, but misunderstood and ultimately somewhat tragic. 

Similar discrepancies add further interesting wrinkles, beginning with the two protagonists, whose freedom from the stereotypical constraints of the period makes them a joy to watch - but who (as Due suggested above) don't enormously act like they're in a horror film and aren't, for example, terribly troubled by the piles of bodies turning up in their home. But even this feels miles ahead of the subservient cowards Black actors had to play in other Old Dark House movies. 

Diversions more typical of the time come in the shape of a couple of seemingly off-the-cuff musical numbers (courtesy of the excellent Four Toppers) and, less enjoyably, an extended skit towards the end involving the aforementioned sandwiches. But, just when you're thinking the film has lost its way at a crucial point, a genuinely gruesome shooting ushers in a climax full of fairly strong stuff. The amount of blood spilled certainly raised an eyebrow from me, anyway, and is nicely foreshadowed by a stylish moment earlier on, in which the camera lingers on a splatter of spilled ink in the aftermath of a murder. (In fact, this entire sequence, featuring eyeballs in extreme close-up and that oozing pool of black, prefigures the famous shower scene of Psycho.)

Flashes of such originality, then, coupled with the uniquely progressive feel of a race picture, make Son of Ingagi a very rewarding watch. Don't worry if you've never seen nor heard of 1930's Ingagi - this has nothing to do with that apparently hard-to-find film - and instead prepare for one of the most offbeat entries in an already offbeat genre.  

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

The Monster Walks

The guests have gathered, the will's been read, the clock strikes twelve... and someone's DEAD! It's time to light a lantern and dust off your hiking boots as we prepare to keep pace with 1932's THE MONSTER WALKS...

Clocking in at an hour, this low-key Old Dark House movie won't trouble your little grey cells with extraneous twists or suspects but plods along purposefully, with some eerie touches and a capable cast. 

It's a dark and corny night, and the curtains billow at the window of the room where Dr Earlton lies dead in his bed. Attorney Herbert Wilkes (Sidney Bracey) has arrived to read the will, while a small party of relatives and servants wait to find out what they'll inherit and who they'll have to kill to get their hands on it. Also in the house - but locked up in a cage in the cellar and not very happy about it - is the doctor's pet chimp, Yogi. "What makes him scream so?" asks the dead man's brother. "That's because of the corpse in the house," replies servant Hanns, relishing every word. "He remembers his dead master."

Of course not everyone is happy with the outcome of the will, which leaves everything to the doctor's daughter, Ruth - or alternatively to his brother in the event that anything happens to Ruth. (So she can't make a will of her own?) And, sure enough, that night, something does happen to Ruth, involving a hairy, ape-like hand emerging from a secret panel behind her bed and reaching for her throat! 

Let's leave the plot there, as we're already halfway through, and reflect instead on the players - thankfully the kind of bunch who can make standing around and talking worth sitting back and listening to. While the stilted dialogue isn't always on their side ("Someone has made a second desperate attempt on Ruth's life!") these pros work near-miracles smoothing off some of its rougher edges. There's the commanding Martha Mattox from the original The Cat and the Canary, reprising her stern housekeeper bit with the addition of a few layers; Mischa Auer as her grown-up son, Hanns, who's all towering hair, dangling limbs and bitterness; and Willie Best as Exodus the driver, who's frankly insulted by the so-called comic relief he's asked to deliver here, but who remains a welcome addition to any cast. 

I mentioned eerie touches earlier and, despite a fairly bland approach to the old house setting, I do think it provides the chills in places, especially during a quiet scene at the halfway mark... Following the stroke of midnight (filmed in thrilling real time!) a gruesome-looking hand slowly pulls a door closed and extinguishes a candle. It's as simple as that, but perfect nightmare fuel to my mind. The killer's 'alibi' (you'll know it when you see it) is also a terrific little detail and not given nearly enough screen time.

I was also delighted to hear one character exclaim "Pshaw!" - something I've come across in print before but never had the joy of hearing! All in all, while I may be being a tad generous with my cobweb rating below, it's refreshing to see an Old Dark House quickie that plays to its strengths and manages to carve out a niche simply by taking itself seriously.  

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

The Gorilla

He MURDERS without mercy! But always sends a quick note beforehand to make sure you're available... So don't be dismissive if you receive a missive from... THE GORILLA! 

I consider 1939 a turning-point in the history of Old Dark House movies, mostly due to the success - and subsequent influence - of The Cat and the Canary, released towards the year's end, in November. The formula was of course nothing new, but the competence and care with which it was delivered redefined the horror-comedy genre in the same way that Scream would fifty years later. Audiences clearly relish the unique thrill of laughing one minute and facing genuine suspense the next - and the trick worked then as it does today, resulting in a raft of imitators and variations on the cat-and-canary theme between 1940 and 1944.

This is really all a long-winded way of saying that, since it was released six months before The Cat and the Canary, The Gorilla is not one of that film's descendants (although it was based on a 1925 stage play inspired by the success of 1922's The Cat and the Canary on Broadway). Instead, The Gorilla feels a bit like a transition piece, taking the surfeit of silliness that marks immediate predecessors like Sh! The Octopus and marrying it with some of the high-Gothic production values of films just over the horizon, such as Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940). The result is, well... interesting! 

I've nothing against its stars, the three Ritz Brothers, who carved out a four-decade career in comedy, but even they were unhappy with the script of this one, according to accounts. You can see why. They barely get a decent gag between them, leaving the door wide open for Patsy Kelly (as scared-but-sarcastic maid, Kitty) to steal the whole thing, with a one-note but still genuinely funny performance. 

Well, almost steal it... Surprisingly, Bela Lugosi comes close with his slyly deadpan turn as Peters the butler. I don't know whether it's the humour vacuum left by the Ritz Brothers or the fact that Bela wasn't usually given much space to fill on the funny-front (or perhaps both) but he certainly makes the most of everything offered to him here. It's funny when he treats the Ritzes as idiots and it's funny when he acts all creepy and suspicious, and because these are the lion's share of what he's required to do... it's all funny! It's even funny when a frightened Kitty practically jumps into his arms for protection. How often did anyone expect that of Bela Lugosi?

This is also a film that ticks a big box for me by having a good opening scene. With Old Dark House movies, it's important to feel that fix of cosy fear early on: in The Gorilla, the camera flies up to the roof of the house (prefiguring Dario Argento's similar cinematic gymnastics in Tenebrae) to witness the arrival of the killer, before swooping back down to a bedroom window to visit an unsuspecting victim reading a book in bed. The mansion set has quite a luscious texture, and is lit as if under constant attack by crawling shadows, while a realistic storm grumbles in the background. 

Also working in The Gorilla's favour (at least during its first half) is its plot. Although it's never really investigated fully, the basic idea of an unknown, monstrous killer sending notes to those he intends to murder (at midnight!) is a nice set-up, and neatly paired with the parallel story of two relatives coming together to discover they're joint beneficiaries in a will - assuming each survives. An early, drawn-out suspense scene finds the entire cast awaiting the hour of twelve to find out if the villain keeps his promise... It's appropriately play-like, a touch eerie, and a suggestion of what might have been achieved if the film had kept its focus. 

Sadly, it doesn't. Not only are there at least three Ritz Brothers too many to keep track of, but a repetitive round of secret passage-hopping at the climax makes everything seem simultaneously shallow and overly complicated. Still, none of this is somehow quite enough to kill it and, if you focus on Bela, Patsy and the rather gorgeous production, The Gorilla holds various charms in its hairy arms. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

The Living Ghost

Is he dead? Is he alive? Or is he caught in a waking nightmare too terrible to describe? Grab yourself a cup of cocoa and a stethoscope as we prepare to examine 1942's THE LIVING GHOST!

Oh, what to do with this one? Is it an Old Dark House movie? Is it even spooky? The title isn't really helping matters (and neither are those ghost-themed opening credits) because here we have a more-or-less straightforward whodunit, complicated not by supernatural elements but by a dash of pseudo-science involving paralysed brain cells. 

Let's try and untangle a couple of other things too: the source of the mystery here isn't actually a murder (at least, not to begin with) but a kidnapping, leading to a sort of zombification deal whereby the victim - he of the paralysed brain cells - loses the ability to think and speak for himself. (I know, we've all been there.) Zombies were all the rage in early 40s cinema but tended to be linked with voodoo rather than science, which gives this an interesting angle. But does it lead to anything we'd class as zombie horror? Well, interestingly, yes... I'll explain more in a moment, but the main reason I'm including The Living Ghost in our Old Dark House canon is because of an extended plot detour that, as in The Ghost Breakers, comes a little late in the game but definitely takes us into scare territory.

So, who's had their brain cells paralysed and why? Over at the Craig mansion, reporters are clamouring at the door for news on the whereabouts of wealthy old Mr Craig, but it seems that none of the gathered relatives know anything about anything, other than the fact that he's vanished. Ex-detective Nick Trayne (now working, bizarrely, as a 'professional listener' dressed in full swami garb) is called in to investigate, but it's not long before Mr Craig reappears - not dead, not injured, not even reduced to an ear in an envelope, but sitting in his armchair in some sort of trance, barely able to blink, never mind explain what happened. 

Nick determines to get to the bottom of things, aided by Mr Craig's young secretary, Billie, who's perhaps worried she'll be out of a job if normality isn't restored sometime soon. Of course, along with their requisite sleuthing, you can expect romance to blossom between this generationally-mismatched duo...

The Living Ghost takes place primarily at two different locations: the bright and pleasant Craig manor (where most of the suspects reside and much of the mystery unfolds) and the derelict 'house on Blakely Road' (as it's referred to in a sort of running joke). The latter is the film's actual Old Dark House, which Nick and Billie explore in a splendid sequence set during a raging storm, with flashes of lightning like nearby explosions practically blasting the actors off their feet. Also roaming the house is another zombified victim - one who's been programmed to kill! The comparatively genteel nature of the rest of the film only adds to the effectiveness of this passage, which also prefigures those famous scenes in 70s gialli like Deep Red, in which protagonists find clues (and worse) in creepy old buildings. 

Putting a dampener on things, however, is that aforementioned romance between the leads, which is rammed in like a shoe on a sandwich and looks about as appetising. It's not really the fault of either actor: Joan Woodbury is lively and fun as Billie, while James Dunn (Nick) went on to win an Oscar just three years later for his work in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. It's just clear that the writers hadn't seen any of the four Thin Man films released by this point, or at least hadn't learned anything about making 'banter' sexy and smart. Instead, Nick's come-ons come off as near-unbearable to modern ears, and the way he 'tests' their relationship borderline abusive. I know you can't judge older films as if they were released recently, but I've seen enough from the 40s to spot the worst offenders - and unfortunately this one's up there!

Thankfully, such moments are relatively brief, and other faces among the cast offer some diversion. Minerva Urecal fills the doomsayer role perfectly ("Hate and death are in this house... If you're wise you'll leave right now!") and the roguish yet dapper George Eldredge is enough to set the heart of any modern hipster a-flutter. The whole thing is clearly influenced by 1939's The Cat and the Canary and its ilk, which if you're anything like me will make it essential viewing. Just be ready to close your eyes and think of Bob Hope! 

RATING: 🕸🕸

The Rogues Tavern

Do you hear the howling in the night outside Red Rock Tavern? Is it the wind? A wolf? Or is it... DEATH?! Find out, if you dare, as we visit 1936's apostrophe-free THE ROGUES TAVERN...

The first three times I attempted to watch this film, I ended up asleep within minutes - which is some sort of personal record, it has to be said, and not one I'm proud of. But, let me stress, this has little to do with the film, the pace, or the eight glasses of wine. The Rogues Tavern simply has such a cosy, comfortable opening that, should you pop it on any later than 10pm, I'm convinced you'll end up drooling down your silk pyjamas too. 

The Red Rock Tavern is all booked-up for the night, its windows rattling as stormy winds whistle outside. In the warmth of the lobby, the guests are gathered around a roaring fire (shown in such loving detail, you can practically feel the heat oozing off the screen). The camera dodders woozily around the room, introducing us to the various parties gathered in the glow of the flames. There's the strikingly beautiful Gloria, reading fortunes for her friend, Mr Harrison, in the cards. (What's that? The ace of spades? Oh, I'm sure it's nothing...) Then there's the smartly-dressed Bill and Mason, toasting their toes at the hearth. (It seems they've each been summoned to the hotel by a mysterious letter but, don't worry, I'm sure it's nothing...) And over at the desk are the establishment's elderly proprietors, Mr and Mrs Jamison, who are busy bossing about Bert the bellhop, when suddenly the door blasts open, admitting a gust of wind and giggly lovers Jimmy and Marjorie. 

They're looking for a justice of the peace, a quickie marriage and a bed for the night, preferably in that order. What they're not looking for, despite being a pair of detectives, is a murder mystery to solve. But that's exactly what they're in for - and you too, if you're still awake - as, over the course of this blustery night, guests start turning up dead, the phone line is cut, and bars descend over the windows, trapping everyone inside...

The first half of The Rogues Tavern does a sterling job of setting up this scenario, with frequent killings, clues that suggest a wild dog on the loose, and that ever-howling wind providing an unnerving ambience. As for our sleuths, Wallace Ford's rather bullish sexism hasn't dated well but Barbara Pepper is a charm and actually gets to do some of the more interesting stuff, whether or not that was the way it was intended.

Where things come a little unstuck is around the point they should be really taking off, unfortunately, as we hit a midpoint lull that's difficult to explain. The carefully built tension just seems to hang there; a few minor but key revelations are trotted out in dull fashion; and it looks like we're heading towards a flat finale, with Ford assembling a group of suspects who were mostly in his presence at the time of the latest murder anyway, meaning they can't be guilty. Thankfully, everything perks up considerably as we head towards the real climax, the nature of which I don't think you'll see coming! It's a mad little treat, rounding off a film that doesn't quite hit the mark but, thanks to its atmosphere, proves more than satisfactory. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸 

Topper Returns

An heiress, a sleuthing ghost, sinister servants, busybody neighbours, the cops, a sea lion and a vicious, black-clad killer... Is there anyone who ISN'T prowling the corridors of Carrington Hall in 1941's TOPPER RETURNS?

First off, you don't need to have seen the previous two Topper films in order to enjoy this rather sparkling entry in the Old Dark House genre. It's more of a spin-off than a sequel. All you really need to know is that Roland Young plays a slightly stuffy, middle-aged banker who, through no fault of his own, seems to attract the attentions of witty, interfering spooks (the Squawking Dead, if you will). It happened in the original Topper (1937) when the haunters were Constance Bennett and Cary Grant, and it happened in Topper Takes a Trip (1938) when Bennett returned without Grant but with an equally deceased dog in tow. In Topper Returns, the spookster role is occupied by a delightfully hilarious Joan Blondell who, for reasons we'll come to, has been bumped off and, not unreasonably, wants to know why. 

Blondell plays Gail Richards, the best friend of Ann Carringon (Carole Landis) who's travelled from China to meet, for the first time, her American father. As per the conditions of her mother's will, she's due to inherit Carrington Hall the following day, her 21st birthday... That is, if she can survive the night. Creepy Dr Jeris (George Zucco) informs her that her poor old Dad is in poor health, while creepy housekeeper Lillian (Rafaela Ottiano) is busy monologuing about the 'charms' of the old mansion: "It's the waves... Day after day, night after night, they beat with savage fury against the black rocks below. For twenty years they've been calling, calling, calling to someone who never answers!" ("Just like the Pot o' Gold programme," quips Gail.) 

That night, after swapping bedrooms with Ann, Gail is shockingly murdered in a shocking case of mistaken murderdentity. Clearly, the killer had designs on soon-to-be-rich Ann, but room-swapping Gail has thrown a spanner in the works, receiving a dagger in the heart. That's when the ghostly business begins, as Gail's soul rises from her body and pops over to the neighbours' house for help. And who would that neighbour be? Why, Cosmo Topper, of course - plus his chauffeur (Mantan Moreland), wife (Billie Burke) and maid (Patsy Kelly), all of whom end up next-door at the manor for various reasons for a night of mystery and mirth.   

With its busy ensemble cast and inventively silly perils, Topper Returns plays like an early forerunner of 80s cult classic Clue, as the talented actors juggle the laughs without leaving anyone out of the fun. (Even the deadpan Zucco gets an amusing bit involving a hidden trapdoor.) It's possibly also the only Old Dark House film to culminate in a car chase - or at least the only one featuring a ghost at the wheel. 

There's no time to get bored along the way, as the action shifts between rooms, rooftops, a giant icebox, underground caverns and even an offshore boat, with detailed sets infusing these with a sense of heightened reality unusual in the genre. A superbly scary moment (one of the only real jolts, to be honest) sees a crashing chandelier plunge one character into a pool of darkness that leaves her fate unknown. Like almost everything here, from the quickfire dialogue to smooth camerawork and Invisible Man-style special effects, you get the sense the stunt was meticulously planned. 

There are some hurdles to jump - the era's dated attitudes providing most of these - but, when it comes to entertainment, this Topper tops most. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸🕸

Black Actors in Old Dark House Movies

Elsewhere on this website, I've suggested that some of the elements of classic Old Dark House films grow from their predecessors in popular entertainment: horror imagery from early silent film, for example, mystery from Gothic fiction, and humour from vaudeville. A far more problematic inheritance, however, is the genre's portrayal of Black people - at best, as one-dimensional stock characters; at worst, the target of demeaning jokes made by white people.  

Just as there's no way to ignore these portrayals, there's no way to defend or excuse them. They appear in such early efforts as 1922's The Ghost Breaker, become particularly prevalent in the genre in the early 1940s, and their influence continues to be felt today. As a result, while some viewers consider the old-fashioned Old Dark House a cosy and safe space to visit, others will feel excluded or insulted. 

Only you can work out where your own line is drawn when it comes to viewing these films as entertainment. My own view is that modern-day genre fans should learn about the history and power of racist stereotypes from sources like Black Horror Movies, the Jim Crow Museum and Black-face.com. While acknowledging the extremely limited stage on which Black actors played in classic Hollywood, Looming Heirs! hopes to honour their accomplishments within an industry where they had little-to-no power. 

For a rare example of an Old Dark House film made with an all-Black cast outside of the mainstream studio system (and therefore subject to the different limitations of being classed as a race film) see 1940's Son of Ingagi. 

Willie Best (1916-1962) arrived in Hollywood as a chauffeur, a role he also played in his first Old Dark House movie, 1932's The Monster Walks, in which he was credited under the stage name Sleep n' Eat. While the film gave him the distinction of speaking the final line, this was unfortunately a racist joke about the monster ape of the title ("I had a grandpappy that looked something like him, but he wasn't as active"). Best was held in high regard by Bob Hope, his co-star in The Ghost Breakers (1940), who called him "the greatest actor I know". He went on to play similar roles in The Smiling Ghost (1941, above), The Hidden Hand (1941) and Whispering Ghosts (1942). The Mississippi Encyclopedia quotes an interview in which he reflects on his career: "I often think about these roles I have to play. Most of them are pretty broad. Sometimes I tell the director and he cuts out the real bad parts. But what’s an actor going to do? Either you do it or get out."

Mantan Moreland (1902-1973) is most famous for playing Charlie Chan's driver, Birmingham Brown, in fifteen films from from 1944 to 1949. Several of these qualify as Old Dark House movies, including Charlie Chan in the Secret Service (1944), Black Magic (1944) and The Jade Mask (1945). Much of Mantan's role in these films amounted to scaredy-cat pratfalls, a holdover from his performances in the earlier horror-comedies, King of the Zombies (1941, above) and Revenge of the Zombies (1943). Interviewed in The Afro American on 9 May 1959, however, he said: "The movies are growing up and I think my characterizations should keep pace with the times. Why shouldn't the role be written so that I solve the murder sometime? At least let me be cast as a little smarter than I have been heretofore."

Eddie "Rochester" Anderson (1905-1977) was known to millions as the character Rochester in The Jack Benny Program on radio and TV between 1937 and 1965. Not Even Past quotes a 1941 editorial from The California Eagle: "It was really a revolution, for Jack Benny’s impudent butler-valet-chauffeur, 'Rochester Van Jones' said all the things which a fifty year tradition of the stage proclaimed that American audiences will not accept from a black man." Unfortunately this wasn't quite true of his role in the same year's Topper Returns (above), which returned him firmly to the scared chauffeur stereotype - but the film did at least give him plenty to do (and the final scene). Anderson's only other Old Dark House role was a bit-part in 1933's mystery-at-sea thriller, Terror Aboard.

Ernie Morrison (1912-1989), billed as 'Sunshine' Sammy Morrison, played Scruno, one of the otherwise white East Side Kids, in two Old Dark House comedies, Spooks Run Wild (1941) and Ghosts on the Loose (1943, above). While all of the gang get similar screen time, Black Horror Movies notes: "Scruno’s fidgety, hunched over, wide-eyed/mouthed character seems, well, just a bit more over-the-top. Plus, he’s the butt of several jokes about no one being able to see him in the dark, and when a white guy gets car exhaust blown in his face, one of the 'kids' yells, 'Hey, it’s Scruno’s uncle!'" After a busy career as a young actor, Morrison quit the movie business to work in the aerospace industry. 

The Thirteenth Guest

Joseph Stefano did it in PSYCHO... Kevin Williamson did it in SCREAM... But screenwriter Frances Hyland bumped off her leading lady even earlier in the 1932 horror-mystery, THE THIRTEENTH GUEST!    

It's my custom to begin these reviews with a little look at the exterior of the Old Dark House in question but, as you can see from the still above, this is one of those annoying cases where it's never really shown. This is about as much as the film provides, glimpsed right at the start. 

But what a start! A taxi pulls up late one night at 'the Old Morgan Place' on Old Mill Road and out steps Marie Morgan (a young Ginger Rogers). She's been lured to the former family homestead on her 21st birthday - which also happens to be the thirteenth anniversary of a dreadful dinner party during which her father not only announced some strange changes to his will, but also dropped dead. What strange changes, you ask? Well, he provided for his wife and immediate family, naturally, but the bulk of his fortune was destined for the party's mysterious 'thirteenth guest' - someone who never actually arrived and whose identity remains unknown. The house has been shut up ever since. 

Back in the present, Marie finds, oddly, the electricity switched on and a new telephone installed in the otherwise derelict and cobweb-choked property, along with an envelope addressed to her. The note inside reads: 13 - 13 - 13. She hears a noise, goes to investigate; we hear a scream, a gunshot... and the next thing we know is Captain Ryan of the local police force is phoning his friend, private investigator Phil Winston, with the promise of a 'really good murder' to solve... 

And, wowee, yes - this one does turn out to be a pretty good case! Not so much the outcome (the final revelation is actually a bit of a let-down) but the journey there involves a roster of suspects who've grown bitchier with each year since their fateful gathering, plus secret passages, a fairly inventive murder weapon and a howling, hooded villain. On top of that, this already quite slasherific killer also likes to pose their victims' bodies around the original dinner table in a Tableau of Death™, a trope that became a slasher film standard fifty years later:

The script finds an excuse to bring Ginger Rogers back after her early exit - a wise decision because she's a lot of fun. The same goes for Lyle Talbot, on a major smarm offensive as the unapologetically sleazy detective, Winston. (This lively duo reunited the following year for another mystery, A Shriek in the Night, also written by Frances Hyland.) Winston's amorous antics, along with some clanging double entendres, make it pretty obvious this one's pre-Code, but there's some surprising shading around two male characters presented as being in a relationship. (A police officer even refers to one as the other's 'boyfriend'.) 

If there is a weakness it's that aforementioned climactic reveal but, coming off the back of some strong suspense and ingenious plotting, I say ignore the black fly and down the chardonnay... It's not always this sweet.  

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

The Three Weird Sisters

THREE creepy dowagers cook up at least FOUR murder attempts in ONE weird film... It's the 1948 proto-psycho-biddy movie, THE THREE WEIRD SISTERS! And it's Welsh. 

I'm genuinely not sure at this point whether having Dylan Thomas co-write the script for your Old Dark House movie is a good idea. On the one hand, this is a more-than-usually clever piece, complete with lyrical turns of phrase and savage deconstructions of Welsh identity; on the other, it's peppered with scenes and conversations that feel like they belong in a different film, and begins a complex exploration of philanthropy and class responsibility that it can't possibly hope to resolve within its scant running-time. 

Let's take the basic scenario for starters: the elderly, Victorian-valued Morgan-Vaughan sisters - Gertrude, Maude and Isobel - preside over the mining town of Cwmglas, which has just suffered a disaster in the form of a pit collapse that's left an entire street in ruins. Gertrude and the gang want to take responsibility and offer financial aid - but their London-based brother, the obnoxious Owen (a step-sibling but, as a man, the one who's naturally in charge of the family fortunes), is having none of it. Intending to put his foot down once and for all, he decides to pay his sisters a visit, dragging along secretary Miss Prentiss for backup. But, before you can say 'mysterious stomach upset' and 'no more trains tonight', the city folk are trapped at the sisters' gloomy mansion until morning... 

You can probably see where this is going. It's no spoiler that the sinister spinsters are out to prune Owen from the family tree, diverting control of the finances to themselves. And, yes, they're puritanical, curmudgeonly and clearly the villains of the piece... but are they really? After all, they want the money to support the beleaguered townsfolk, while boorish Owen simply wants to keep it (and all control) to himself. 

Everyone's motives do eventually receive some further shading: Dylan Thomas apparently invests something of himself in Owen, who it turns out has had to work hard to escape the pressures of his old-fashioned, backward-looking clan, and at one point mounts a frankly astonishing condemnation of his home country ("Slag heaps and pit heads and vile black hills... How vile was my valley!"). And through those odd little diversions into local scenery, we see some of the damage wrought on 'the workers' and their lives by their land-owning masters, who've pushed the mines to literal breaking-point.

These are weighty themes and, to be honest, the film frequently drops them with a clang in favour of exploiting its more macabre possibilities, such as the string of murder attempts that make up most of its plot. The unwitting Owen comes under threat from poisoned sherry...

Plummeting clocks...

Mysteriously missing road signs...

And a build-up of lethal coke fumes...

...before eventually coming up with a counter-scheme that neatly removes him from the equation, but not without inadvertently(?) putting his secretary in the deadly trio's line of fire! It's here - in, admittedly, the more traditional woman-in-peril moments - that the film is at its most successful. Nova Pilbeam, as the capable and outspoken Miss Prentiss, genuinely shines, making it clear why Hitchcock chose to work with her on both The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) and Young and Innocent (1937). 

The Three Weird Sisters makes for a suspenseful and unpredictable experience, and even if, at the end of the ride, it seems content to just coast into the station, you can't say it hasn't been a bit of a wild one. The revered farce Kind Hearts and Coronets would come along a year later, turning murderous succession into an art form, but given the choice I think I'd rather spend a night with the malicious Morgan-Vaughans. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

Defining the Old Dark House Genre

What is an Old Dark House movie? A kind of mystery or horror film? Or just anything set in a big old house? And what's with all the comic relief?

Let's slow down, take a sip of cocoa, and start to answer these questions with a quick think about the concepts of genre and subgenre. If we take horror as a genre, for example, it seems fairly clear what that is - and it's not too difficult to identify subgenres within it like 'zombie horror' and 'possession horror'. Most people, myself included, would probably describe Old Dark House movies as something of a subgenre too, but where it gets cloudier is deciding what they're a subgenre of.

That's because the Old Dark House film is a unique blend of horror, comedy and mystery, intersecting with - rather than slotting into - each of those genres. Its closest neighbours are perhaps the 'country house whodunit' (which focuses on the puzzle aspect of the crime) and the haunted-house film (where the supernatural is the mystery). The Old Dark House movie flits between all of the above like a mischievous moth, attracted to the candles but never settling for fear of getting its wings singed. 

I'm going to go out on a bit of a limb and suggest that horror is the key component here. Old Dark House films first took root in the silent film tradition - and many of the silent era's lasting images are those of terror. Think Nosferatu, Caligari, the violence of Battleship Potemkin and the uncanny robots of Metropolis. While the intricacies necessary for a truly satisfying murder mystery might be hard to convey within a silent movie, put a helpless victim in the foreground and a shadowy figure in the background, and you don't need sound to convey a feeling of fear.

The name 'Old Dark House' stuck to the genre for a reason. In fact, I think it acts as a neat little identifier with which to highlight some of the main themes in question, so let's break it down:

THE 'OLD': The weight of the past hangs heavily over the characters and situations of an Old Dark House movie. It may be in the form of a supposed curse or treasure or, more frequently, an inheritance of 'old money' that comes with conditions... and grudges. Age itself is also often a theme, with our heroes tending to be 'young and innocent', while older authority figures have often been rendered powerless by infirmity or, even worse, become corrupted. 

THE 'DARK': Herein lies the horror element of the Old Dark House genre, represented literally in the gloomy, stormy nights its stories inhabit and more figuratively by its common themes. These include insanity (both the villain's psyche or an affliction to ruin our heroes), the unknown (even supernaturally so) and, of course, the ultimate fear - death. 

THE 'HOUSE': More than merely the setting for an Old Dark House mystery, the house is almost a character. In fact, I'd argue that it's actually an extension of the villain's character: something that exists to endanger the heroes, often being exploited by a killer who makes use of secret passages, locked rooms and torture chambers. The 'house' may also take the form of any forbidding space, whether that be an old lighthouse (Sh! The Octopus), deserted station (The Ghost Train) or even a pirate ship (Whispering Ghosts).

Another key idea I'm floating here on Looming Heirs! is an end-date for what I'm calling the 'classic' Old Dark House movie - that year being 1960. I'm not arguing that relevant films weren't released beyond then (after all, William Castle's remake of The Old Dark House appeared in 1963) but I do think these are of a slightly different ilk, with heightened states of parody and postmodern artificiality (see Murder by Death, Clue and the like). What changed things? Well, Psycho for a start, with its grim tone and envelope-pushing... Once you've been to the Bates Motel, a visit to The Rogues Tavern or House on Haunted Hill just doesn't cut it. 

Two other influential films released in 1960 further rocked the foundations of the Old Dark House: Mario Bava's Black Sunday and Roger Corman's The Fall of the House of Usher - each echoing with themes of death and madness, and both more complex properties than the films of the classic era. 

Remember as we explore the cosier classics at Looming Heirs! that there are always going to be a few that break the mould (and no doubt I'll cover them) but, basically, if I think a film has even the slightest chance of conjuring up that warm and welcoming glow for the Old Dark House film fan, it'll get a much-deserved look-in here.

[Poster image above from Wikimedia Commons.]

Lost Old Dark House Films

With three-quarters of all silent films thought to be lost, according to the Library of Congress, it's inevitable that a number of Old Dark House movies would count among these. Future discoveries may yet be made; indeed, 1932's The Old Dark House was itself believed lost for almost forty years until a print turned up in a studio vault. But, as time ticks on, it looks like all that's left of the following films are photographs, snippets and memories. 

The Ghost Breaker (1914) was possibly the first filming of an Old Dark House story, directed by none other than Cecil B. DeMille, who also had a hand in the script (based on Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's 1909 play, which was first staged in 1913). The story, concerning a spooky castle left to an unsuspecting heir, has been filmed multiple times, with the quintessential version perhaps being 1940's The Ghost Breakers.

The Circular Staircase (1915) adapted the popular 1908 novel by Mary Roberts Rinehart. A full synopsis and contemporary review quotes are given in the book American Silent Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Feature Films, 1913-1929 by John T. Soister, Henry Nicolella and Steve Joyce. Print ads from the time read: "There was a shot in the night and two dead bodies lay huddled in the shadows at the foot of 'The Circular Staircase' before threads of fate were finally unravelled." 

Seven Keys to Baldpate (1916) was an Australian silent movie, closer to a filmed version of George M. Cohan's stage play of the same name, recorded against canvas sets at the Theatre Royal, Melbourne. Three of its four reels survive.   

The Ghost Breaker (1922) again used Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's play as its basis. Lots of lobby cards are still in existence and can be seen as part of a thorough overview of the film at the Lost Media Wiki. 

London After Midnight (1927), starring Lon Chaney, is one of the most famous lost films of all time and, as such, there's tons of information available about it on Wikipedia. Director Tod Browning remade it in 1935 as Mark of the Vampire, and TCM created a reconstruction using stills in 2002. 

The Terror (1928) was the first of three English-language adaptations of an Edgar Wallace play, later filmed as The Return of the Terror in 1934 and again as simply The Terror in 1938. (A German version entitled Der Unheimliche Mönch/The Sinister Monk turned up in 1965.) It had the distinction of being the first horror film with a soundtrack - in this case a Vitaphone record, which you can read all about at Vitaphone Varieties.

The House of Horror (1929) came from Danish director Benjamin Christensen, and was another Old Dark House film with a soundtrack in the form of an accompanying Vitaphone record of music and sound effects. Michael R. Pitts' book, Thrills Untapped: Neglected Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1928-1936, provides a full synopsis and quotes from critics, and there's more at Vitaphone Varieties.

The Cat Creeps (1930) was a sound remake of 1927's The Cat and the Canary, from which the only remaining footage is incorporated into a 10-minute short film from Universal Pictures called Boo! (1932). As with Universal's 1931 film of Dracula, a Spanish version called La Voluntad del Muerto (The Will of the Dead Man) was filmed using the same sets but this is also lost. Both are thankfully discussed in some detail over at Movies and Mania.

The Gorilla (1930) was based on Ralph Spence's play and, like the same year's The Cat Creeps, came with a Vitaphone soundtrack record. The Lost Media Wiki again has a lovely write-up, including a 28-second clip that turned up in 2003. 

Castle Sinister (1932) was a British horror film that just preceded the Boris Karloff-starring The Ghoul. Thanks to the research of Mark Fryers at The Spooky Isles, we have a full description. 

Sources: As well as from the articles sited, this information draws on the various films' Wikipedia articles, and uses images from Wikimedia Commons.