The Haunting (1963)
In case you think that this is a case of me liking the remake over the original, let me put your mind at ease. I hate the remake too. The Haunting is widely considered one of the scariest films of all time and a horror classic. I can’t stand it. I find it uneventful, long-winded, incoherent and tedious. I actually had to watch and analyze the film in my horror film class in college, which made me like it even less. It is beautifully shot and Wise’s unique camerawork mimics the paranoia and tension present throughout the film. The Haunting is notable for having a lesbian character in Theo (Claire Bloom), and the film could serve as a metaphor for Eleanor’s (Julie Harris) repressed homosexuality (that eventually kills her), which isn’t something Shirley Jackson, the author of the novel that the film it is based on, intended (though Theo’s lesbianism is hinted at in the novel). To her, The Haunting was very much a supernatural story. Screenwriter Nelson Gidding thought otherwise and made the film about Eleanor’s mental breakdown. Whether or not a supernatural element is actually present is up to the audience to decide. By the end of the film, I didn’t care. I just wanted it to be over.