The Old Dark House | Rotten Tomatoes (2025)

Audience Reviews

Jess Excellent film! Spooky old house on a dark and stormy night, filled with an assortment of colorful and creepy characters. Perfect blend of genuine chills and dashes of humor. Rated 5/5 Stars • Rated 5 out of 5 stars 10/31/23 Full Review nick s Not sure why the reviews are so gushing for this movie. It was neither horror nor comedy. And the slipshod writing felt like it was made up on set.Cinematography and some of the acting were the only highlights. Oh, and the risque 30s outfits. Rated 2.5/5 Stars • Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 07/02/24 Full Review g j A very promising and engaging first act abruptly peters out into tedium. Its well acted and well shot, but pretty dull. Rated 3/5 Stars • Rated 3 out of 5 stars 03/10/24 Full Review S R Unusual and bizarre, but ultimately harmless. Fun cast and interesting. Saw on tubi. Rated 2.5/5 Stars • Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 02/10/24 Full Review DanTheMan 2 Spooky Season is upon us again, rather than starting out this year with a movie I was already familiar with, I thought I'd take the plunge with something completely unknown to me. Having deeply enjoyed James Whale's Univeral Monster movies, I knew I had to give another of his films a go this year and finally settled on The Old Dark House. Dripping with atmosphere and hilariously grim, Whale manages to parody the conventions of the haunted house horror genre as he creates them, in many ways managing to craft a film that puts many modern horror films to shame. Packed to the brim with thrills, chills and gallows humour, The Old Dark House combines Whale's marvellous stylistic flourishes and outstanding direction with witty drawing-room dialogue and campy theatrical indulgence. Rated 4/5 Stars • Rated 4 out of 5 stars 10/01/23 Full Review Matthew B James Whale's film was not the first ‘old dark house movie', but it was the quintessential contribution to this particular sub-genre, even if it was considered a lost movie until its rediscovery in the 1950s.In The Old Dark House, Whale established or reinforced the conventions of this enjoyably creaky form of mystery thriller, adding lashings of horror and comedy. Typical features of these films would include murders, a doomed family, a large and empty house, often with secret passageways (though not this time) and various sinister goings-on.Whale invested his film with the trademarks of his style, which often worked to make the films seem more like a parody of the genres to which they belonged, rather than a reverent treatment of them. He made use of a cast given to camp and over-ripe performances, such as Boris Karloff, Ernest Thesiger, Eva Moore, Charles Laughton and Raymond Massey.The director devoted much time to creating the right creepy atmosphere. The old dark house is dimly-lit, and filled with shadows and flickering lights. The walls are pockmarked, and one corridor contains a perpetually billowing curtain. A bedroom has a distorted mirror that seems to belong in a funhouse. This seems to reflect the distorted worldview of the woman who inhabits it. The banister posts on the stairway are topped by strange-looking creatures.None of this makes any logical sense. These elements exist to create a mood – eerie and sinister perhaps, but with a certain sense of mischievous fun. If we laugh at such details, I suspect it is because Whale intends us to laugh.The Old Dark House was based on a J B Priestley novel, which the author intended as a social commentary on the British class structure following World War 1. Whale stops short of preaching any overt political message, but his film does seem to have a satirical tinge that is directed against these bizarre wealthy people.Whale fills the movie with atmospheric flourishes. A game of shadow puppetry is interrupted by another, more menacing shadow. The scarred hand of Morgan seizes the door held by Margaret, and Whale provides several staccato close-ups of Morgan's ugly face, each shot closer to Morgan's face than the last, as the butler looms over the young wife.At other times there is a deliberate use of bathos. Think of the hand on the banister and the insane cackle that precedes the appearance of Saul. When he emerges, he looks like a frightened old man of diminutive stature, but even this proves illusory. The more he talks the more dangerous Saul begins to sound.The Old Dark House is more of a fun movie than one which has any serious message. Nonetheless Whale pushes the story towards something resembling art by his gift for great visuals, and his sly, subversive humour that subtly places a mine under the bastions of respectable society.I wrote a longer appreciation of The Old Dark House on my blog page if you would like to read more: https://themoviescreenscene.wordpress.com/2022/06/17/the-old-dark-house-1932/ Rated 5/5 Stars • Rated 5 out of 5 stars 09/05/23 Full Review Read all reviews

The Old Dark House

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