Travis Simpkins: Vincent Price

Showing posts with label Vincent Price. Show all posts

Friday, October 19, 2018

House on Haunted Hill (1959): Vincent Price

Directed by William Castle and starring the one-and-only Vincent Price, House on Haunted Hill (1959) is a low-budget masterpiece of the macabre. Castle, an eccentric, wanted his film to extend beyond the screen. So, in select theaters, he had elaborate pulley systems rigged so that a plastic skeleton could swing and hover above the audience at the proper moments. Such gimmicks proved to be a success... so much so, that even Alfred Hitchcock was impressed with how House on Haunted Hill was able to accomplish so much with so little, and Hitchcock set out to make his own low-budget horror film soon after... called Psycho (1960).

Millionaire Frederick Loren (Vincent Price) is hosting a party for his 4th wife Annabelle (Carol Ohmart) in a creepy haunted mansion...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

He has invited five strangers, offering them $10,000 each if they can make it through the night in the cursed home...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

The task is far from simple, as ghoulish figures appear...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

and mistrust grows to murder...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

increased tension leads to fright as the walls are closing in...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

but is it really a supernatural force at play...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959

or something else entirely...

The House on Haunted Hill. 1959: Vincent Price

Saturday, September 29, 2018

Dragonwyck (1946): Gene Tierney and Vincent Price

Although certainly not her best film, Dragonwyck (1946), is a solid effort (directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz adapted from a good Gothic Novel of the same name), and any film featuring the mesmerizing beauty of Gene Tierney is worthwhile. Vincent Price and Walter Huston are great in supporting roles as well. The cinematography is stark and dramatic, perfectly projecting the intended gothic feel. The combination of a cursed, ghostly mansion and Miss Tierney's lovely visage is seemingly a win/win scenario...

1844... Miranda Wells (Gene Tierney) is a simple Connecticut farm girl. She is surprised and delighted when an aristocratic distant relative, Nicholas Van Ryn (Vincent Price) invites her to live at his mansion house, Dragonwyck, and be the Governess to his young daughter...

Dragonwyck. 1946: Gene Tierney

Though ominous, Dragonwyck is beautiful and elegant, both outside...

Dragonwyck. 1946: Gene Tierney

as well as in...

Dragonwyck. 1946: Gene Tierney

Things are odd at Dragonwyck, however. The parents relationship to the daughter is non-existent. The Lady of the house is suspiciously ill. The servants talk and warn of century-old curses and ghosts. Nicholas Van Ryn is being threatened by revolting tenant farmers. And after the mysterious death of his wife, Nicholas Van Ryn expresses his love for Miranda...

Dragonwyck. 1946: Gene Tierney

Will she stay and live the elegant life, or are these new surroundings too bizarre and scary?

Dragonwyck. 1946: Gene Tierney

Leave Her to Heaven (1945): Gene Tierney

Based on the best selling novel of the same name by Ben Ames Williams, Leave Her to Heaven (1945) is often cited as the high point of Gene Tierney's career. She looks absolutely stunning, her classically beautiful visage perfectly captured in brilliant technicolor. Dramatically, Leave Her to Heaven has her most versatile performance displayed, for which she was nominated for the Best Actress Academy Award. The film is a sort of Film Noir, with Gene Tierney's character being as chilling a Femme Fatale as one could never hope to meet. She was especially proud of her work on the film, saying in her autobiography A Portrait, it was "the finest work I have done."

The story centers on Richard Harland (Cornel Wilde)- a novelist, who, leaving his invalid teenage brother to recuperate at a hospital, boards a train to New Mexico on a much needed vacation. On board, he meets young Ellen Berent (Gene Tierney), who's unrivaled beauty leaves Harland to think about little else...