The Haunting (film)

Claire Bloom and Julie Harris in The Haunting (1963)

It may be one of the scariest horror movies of all time -- at least among those that have no blood, no body parts, no chattering skeletons -- and it's surely one of the best adaptations of an American work of horror. Directed in 1963 by Robert Wise (West Side Story, The Sound of Music, The Andromeda Strain), it stars Julie Harris as Eleanor Lance, alongside Claire Bloom as Theodora (with wardrobe by Mary Quant, credited as the inventor of the "mini skirt"), Russ Tamblyn (later to star in West Side Story as well, but best known as Dr. Jacoby in David Lynch's Twin Peaks), and Richard Johnson as "Dr. Markway" (oddly changed from the "Dr. Montague" of the novel). Interestingly, Wise's first choice for Markway was Peter Ustinov, but he declined due to other commitments (he was directing his own play, "Photo Finish," on Broadway).

Other than that, though, it's a remarkably faithful adaptation of Shirley Jackson's novel The Haunting of Hill House; Jackson was personally invited to one of the premieres by the director, and by all accounts she was delighted with it. Nevertheless, there are a number of important scenes that are missing; most notable perhaps  is that in the film Eleanor doesn't stop at a small café, and doesn't observe a young girl who refuses to drink her milk until she has her "cup of stars." This small but vital scene has spawned, as fate would have it, a sort of cottage industry of memes, posters, and yes of course cups, all dedicated to the spirit of Eleanor's silent, internal cheering on of the resistant girl. Indeed, though there's a great deal of voice-over with Eleanor's voice -- quite a lot, from the point of view of film -- it's only a small selection of the far more constant stream of her thinking which runs throughout almost the entire length of the novel. The role of the psychic investigator's wife -- Mrs. Montague/Mrs. Markway -- is also quite different in book and film. And, since the film was shot in England, where people drive on the other side of the road, the producers simply flipped the film; they also added a few highway signs for "Route 128," though they neglected to change a placard on a home from "House to Let" to "House for Sale," the more usual American phrase.

Ettington Park Hotel

The interiors of Hill House were all constructed on a soundstage, but for exteriors, they needed a real building -- and they chose an old manor house, since converted to a hotel, not far outside of Stratford-on-Avon (Shakespeare's birthplace). Known as the Ettington Park, it is one of those places on some people's bucket list to stay -- alongside, no doubt, the Stanley Hotel, which was used for exteriors of the "Overlook Hotel" in Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining." Those who do stay at Ettington Park will face just two slight disappointments -- there's no library with a spiral staircase -- and no haunted nursery, either. Perhaps they should consider adding them!

NB: I've added a set of discussion questions -- they are optional -- if responding to them is preferable, use them freely; otherwise, feel free to comment on any aspect of either the novel or the film. I also encourage you to consider responding to one another; that's often where the most interesting comments come about!

Also: here's an excellent site with some background on the film's production.

The Haunting of Hill House (part 1)

 Laura Miller, in her recent introduction to a new edition of the book, describes it as "setting a trap" -- both for its main character, Eleanor Vance, and for its reader. The trap is an improved version of the old "Poe" model: get your reader into the head of the protagonist, and once they're there, you can lure them into the deepest and darkest places, and they'll have nowhere else to go!

But it's also more than just a trap. Eleanor is a a curious sort of person -- somewhat reticent, shy, and inwardly turned -- indeed, she could very well fit the profile of many members of today's Gen-X and Gen-Y generations. She's also been victimized by a bossy sister, and saddled with the care of their aging, ailing mother.  In part as a result, she's had very little social contact outside the family; when she receives the invitation from Dr. Montague, the most significant thing about it is that it's an actual invitation -- and now, she's "expected" somewhere. Whether Hill House is haunted or cursed or just old and creepy matters not; what matters is that it's a house, a house where she's wanted, expected, and in which she belongs.

Which of course makes her the perfect central character for a horror novel.

According to an account by Paula Guran, Jackson had decided to write "a ghost story" after reading about a group of nineteenth-century "psychic researchers" who studied a house and somberly reported their supposedly scientific findings to the Society for Psychic Research. What she discovered in their "dry reports was not the story of a haunted house, it was the story of several earnest, I believe misguided, certainly determined people, with their differing motivations and background." Excited by the prospect of creating her own haunted house and the characters to explore it, she launched into research. She later claimed to have found a picture of a California house she believed was suitably haunted-looking in a magazine. She asked her mother, who lived in California, to help find information about the dwelling. According to Jackson, her mother identified the house as one the author's own great-great-grandfather, an architect who had designed some of San Francisco's oldest buildings, had built. Jackson also read volume upon volume of traditional ghost stories while preparing to write her own, "No one can get into a novel about a haunted house without hitting the subject of reality head-on; either I have to believe in ghosts, which I do, or I have to write another kind of novel altogether."

So, do you believe in ghosts? Does one need to, in order be enthralled by a tale that includes them? And as to houses, perhaps you know a haunted-looking one in your neighborhood. In your comments, let your fellow students know what views you had before -- and after -- entering Hill House; if you like, you can make use of these discussion questions, which are keyed to the first half of the novel.

"The Bus"

Original 1965 illustration for "The Bus"

With each miniature masterwork, Shirley Jackson gets a little more "under our skin." Here again, we have a tale of displacement: of time, distance, and of the sudden loss -- or acquisition -- of a feeling of familiarity. We've all had those moments of dissociation -- familiar things seeming suddenly unfamiliar, and vice versa -- but what if, after we rubbed our eyes, they still remained reversed?

"The Bus" is filled with the small frustrations of the everyday, amplified since we know that the main character is elderly, and at times confused. She is determined, all the same, to reach her destination. How many times have any of us heard the words "this is your stop" from a bus driver or conductor -- who are we to question them? We begin, indeed, with empathy: what a sad turn of events -- what will happen to this innocent old woman? And then, by slow degrees, we begin to anticipate another fate: is this just some random house, with a faint whiff of familiarity? Or is it, though at first unrecognized, home?

Not only buses, but bus stations can be sites of our disorientation. In the Twilight Zone episode "Mirror Image," we meet Millicent Barnes, a seemingly clear-headed and intelligent young woman who's waiting for a bus to take her to the town of Cortland, where she's about to start a new job. As in Jackson's story, the ticket agent is a bit of a crabby man, but in this episode strange things start to happen long before any bus arrives. Millicent's suitcase is already checked -- or is it? -- and, after a trip to the washroom, she catches a glimpse of a familiar figure in the waiting room: herself!

The arrival of a friendly fellow passenger offers at least a sympathetic ear, and partial relief from the confusion -- until it doesn't. As was the trademark in the Twilight Zone, even the twist at the ending has another twist, as Serling's unmistakeable voice intones that all he has to offer are "reasons dredged out of the shadows to explain away that which cannot be explained."