#the haunting (1963)

[normasshearer]

What are you afraid of, Theo? - Of knowing what I really want.

Julie Harris & Claire Bloom as Eleanor Lance and Theodora in THE HAUNTING (1963) dir. Robert Wise

[bwallure]

THE HAUNTING (1963) dir. Robert Wise

[mourningmaybells]

[cheryl-williams]

THE HAUNTING 1963 || dir. ROBERT WISE

[fuddlyduddly]

Hey, I saw you talking about reading The Haunting of Hill House via a trans lens and I got curious. Could you elaborate on that, please? Cause I found it really interesting.

yeah I can! I've been meaning to write some sort of article about why I feel Hill House is trans, so this is a good excuse to get these thoughts written out.It's mostly that I find the story and its themes to be very trans to me, specifically with the character of Eleanor; when I was a teen and didn't know I was trans, and I found myself drawn to her for reasons I couldn't understand yet. There are a lot of things about her that spoke to me as a pre egg-crack trans woman; the way she feels like she's been waiting her whole life for something, anything, but she doesn't know what; the way she's felt trapped by the expectations of her; the way she's so shy and withdrawing (she reminds me in a way of this quote from Imogen Binnie's Nevada: "Maria is transsexual and she is so meek she might disappear"); the ways in which Eleanor constantly feels out of touch with the people around her and can't figure out social situations; the ways she's never felt wanted ("I am a sort of stray cat aren't I?"); the way she is prone to misreading casual relationships because she isn't experienced enough to know she's mistaken; and especially how she so desperately wants to belong. Eleanor is so withdrawn and desperate for connection that she lets the House take her over because, at last, “something is at last really, really, really, happening to [her]”, and unfortunately I could relate to that; she's so desperate to belong that she'll let anything happen to her, even if it kills her.

One line in particular really speaks to me every time I reread the book: “—and then each year, one summer morning, the warm wind would come down the city street where she walked and she would be touched with the little cold thought: I have let more time go by.” To me, that's what it felt like pre realization, every year would go by and I'd feel like I'd missed something; I wouldn't know what, but I'd know I'd let more time go by. Eleanor's story is one of a person who's been waiting so long to make a change, that when a change finally happens, it's too late for her; she's waited too long, and she's out of time. It's rather bleak, but so is gender dysphoria.

I think for me ultimately, any story about a woman who feels trapped and out of touch in some way will feel trans to me (I have a Letterboxd list about that with all sorts of movies on it), but Hill House really sticks out to me because of how acute and specific Eleanor's pain is, and how relatable I found her; her pain feels very transfeminine to me in ways I'm not quite sure how to articulate. I've found a lot of other transfems on tumblr who are also very drawn to Hill House, and in a way its very nice to see us all have a special connection to this book.

also part of this realization came from this post!

[shirleyjacksonism]

this is me, and I am here

Sharp Objects, Gillian Flynn // The Haunting (1963) // The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson // Peter: A Darkened Fairytale, William O'Brien // Hangsaman, Shirley Jackson

[mater-argento]

[fanofspooky]

Horror movies of 1963

[girltomripley]

— JOURNEYS END IN LOVERS MEETING: ELEANOR VANCE

My Tears Ricochet by Taylor Swift x Haunted Doll House by Laurie Lipton x The Haunting (1963) x The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson x Haunted House by Morris Kantor x I Know The End by Phoebe Bridgers

[mygreatadventurehasbegun]

Time for a horror movie poll!

Specifically, a poll about my two favorite creepy and atmospheric black and white ghost movies.

The Innocents (1961)

Miss Giddens has taken a job as a governess to two small children (Miles and Flora) at an English country estate. Upon arrival, she starts to suspect that there is something...strange about her two charges. She also begins to see people that she knows are dead watching her and the children and starts to believe that these spirits desire to possess Miles and Flora. But are those spirits really there? Or is this all in the mind of a sheltered and overly imaginative woman? Adapted from the Henry James novel "The Turn of the Screw", this movie is unsettling and ambiguous with some of the most gorgeous black and white cinematography you'll ever see.

The Haunting (1963)

Four strangers gather together at an old mansion that is believed to be haunted. They are led by a doctor who wishes to study supernatural and paranormal phenomena. One member of the group, Nell, is extremely sensitive to the goings on of the house (partly due to her still processing and grieving the loss of a family member)...that she begins to believe that she belongs there and that the house belongs to her. The quartet is completed by a mysterious woman with ESP and the skeptical young man who expects to inherit the house. Adapted from Shirley Jackson's "The Haunting of Hill House", this movie is the perfect example of less-is-more horror. You don't see anything, yet you are tense from their first night in that home, as the lonely spirits start to affect our group in different ways.

[normasshearer]

You're frightened, Nell. - Oh, no more. Just when I thought I was all alone.

Julie Harris & Claire Bloom in THE HAUNTING (1963) dir. Robert Wise

[horror-thriller-brackets]

Propaganda:

Nevermore: It's a webtoon based on the writing of Edgar Allen Poe and set primarily in a school for the dead, run by two identical and ambiguously human Deans. One student, who passes the semester, will be given the chance to live again. None of the characters really remember how they died, but we're being slowly given bits and pieces of their lives. Ghosts, deception, undead deer, the fear of madness. The two leads (Annabel and Lenore) were engaged in life, but have formed two opposing groups within the school. I would say that it does definitely qualify as gothic romance. Go give it a read.

[antique-ro-man]

This is where I post from. by the way.

[lgbt-cishet-movie-tournament]

The biggest victims AND perpetuators of homophobia...

How is it cishet media?

The Exorcist: A movie (sort-of) beloved by the Catholic Church that promotes traditional family values. Has a lot of homophobic language, and it was released around Christmas. Only one gay character and they only tell you through a flamboyant gesture. Screen writer and book author was homophobic enough to make petitions to "un-catholic" the catholic school featured in this film (they were reaching out to gay students and having pride so he wrote an angry letter to the bishop) and it shows. The Vatican once invited the director to come over specifically because of the exorcist :(((

The Haunting: In the movie adaptation, Eleanor calls Theo "nature’s mistake" for being a big lesbian. She’s also in love with the scientist and looks at him like this 👁👄👁, instead of her being desperately and hopelessly in love with Theo in the book. Thanks to the tv series, people even think they're het and bisexual blood-related sisters. She was very much a stranger in the closet and gay for her. For the love of god read the book!!!

The Servant: 🤔🤔🤔 Is it homophobic for a butler to ruin a man and a woman's marriage, then systematically create a platonic co-dependent relationship with the ex-groom-to-be and turn him into a sexed-up alcoholic? (it's worse in the book. the butler tries to make up evidence that his master is a gay pedophile to blackmaile him).

How is it lgbt?

The Servant: Tony cries pathetically next to pictures of sexy athletic men in their underwear on his bed and it’s never explained. The conflict is largely pushed by the scene where Tony and his fiancee Susan see his butler Barrett naked in Tony's room after having sex. Also?? The way Barrett yanks up Tony's tie like he's about to dominate him??? They didn't have sex, but they did have sex with the same girl in the same time frame when she was in on it. I consider this toxic yaoi and a psychosexual class war. I'll put photos.

Haunting: Oh my goddddd is Eleanor still so repressed and dealing with internalized homophobia in the movie. She and Theodora have a love-hate-attraction-repulsion thing going on. Theo is lesbian-coded and was even supposed to have a female lover in the movie (her "roommate" in the book) but then came censorship. Eleanor calling Theo "unnatural" in the movie... that is a vintage code word for lesbian (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QF2FKI7Fe-U). Before that, she was totally smitten even if the scientist distracts from that. The book is more lesbian, but at least the movie sneaks it in. And it sucks that Eleanor is so angry and lashing out but I get it. Her family hates or at least doesn't care about her feelings. n it's about how unsafe the traditional family structure really is even when you try to do found family but no one likes you for being gay and uptight. Oh and Theo, who is lesbian, survives at the end in all versions.

Exorcist: Regan is sooo off-putting and a bad daughter. This is just what being queer and having several diseases is like minus the exorcism. Her voice gets deep while she acts rebellious and her mom rejects her. Damien Karras (the younger priest) also reads as so repressedly gay and in the closet in the original book, but the movie squeezes in a bit of that with a scene where Fr. Dyer lays Karras to bed, and they hold hands until Karras eventually recoils with so much pathetic pain. I KNOW what you are. (https://afieldinengland.tumblr.com/post/657429236105248768/they-were-in-love-here) Karras and Dyer are even closer in the book, and Dyer is his stereotypically effeminate "ride or die" gay best friend. He told him to leave the priesthood with him since the gays are doing it, meanwhile all the other local priests were panicking about gay priests. The movie is extremely quotable too and I find that camp. Also found "Mother what's wrong with me?" and "That thing upstairs is not my daughter" to be sooo personal. I know it's homophobic but it helped me come out more somehow because I don't want to DIE like that. Saw some fun Regan MacNeil dragqueens, trans posts and non-binary comics (with regan and karras) awhile ago as well. In the 90s, a reviewer said that the movie was actually a priest's homoerotic wet dream (and that's why they wanted to kill pazuzu the "female element") and it so threw off the director to the point that his biography, an analytical book on the exorcist by kermode, AND some articles will bring it up as a bizarre theory or serious analysis. Well I say the reviewer had a point, but with the wrong priest. Dyer is the only confirmed gay character who gets censored a lot, but I know what those two had. Big closeted catholic energy. That's why Regan was so homophobic. She read Karras' mind.

Haunting Propaganda

The Exorcist Propaganda

The Servant propaganda:

[fuddlyduddly]

I've been thinking about how Eleanor from Hill House is a bit like Casey from World's Fair. both are so desperate for their daily lives to be disrupted that they'll let something else take them over, either the "freedom" of letting Hill House influence you and claim you, or the freedom of giving yourself over entirely to the world of an internet role playing game. in both cases, they end up not getting what they want, and feel lonelier than ever, since Casey barely gets any views on her posts, and Eleanor can barely connect to the other Hill House guests in a way she can accept