What old films are there (70s or earlier) which are genuinely unsettling?
Pic related: Night of the Demon (Curse of the Demon in US). Really pretty creepy even though it gives aay the monster in the opening scenes. It's based on the M.R. James story Casting the Runes.
>>70763816
And it was the basis for Raimi's Drag Me to Hell
Hrm, I'm glad you asked this. I'm a big fan of these sorts of things. I ended up making a list of movies that were
1) Black and white.
2) Maybe supernatural, maybe not
And you can look for films like The Uninvited, I Bury the Living, The Devil's Hand, and so forth, but for my money what you need to do is pick up Val Lewton.
Cat People
Curse of the Cat People (NOT scary, just ... weird)
The Ghost Ship (so-so)
The Seventh Victim (darrrrrk for its time)
He did a lot of movies that were in that same vein. The guy who made Night of the Demon used to work for Lewton.
>>70763816
Lemora: a Child's Tale of the Supernatural has some really spooky atmosphere.
>>70764048
What an exciting figure you have.
>>70763925
Have you seen Isle of the Dead? Boris Karloff as an officer in the Greek civil war stuck on an island with a Vorvoloka.
>>70764157
It's on my "to watch" list. I got the complete Val Lewton set.
Try to get hold of the UK version (Night of the Demon) as opposed to the US (Curse of the Demon) as Curse has some effective, atmosphere-building scenes cut.
Here was my criteria:
1) Black and white.
2) Supernatural horror or horror where at first it is ambiguous as to whether it is natural phenomena or something spooky (Carnival of Souls).
3) No aliens, no atom age vampires, no brains in jars, no axe-happy maniacs.
4) Not played for comedy.
5) Snappy dialogue (The Uninvited, Curse of the Demon)
6) Filmed in English or appropriately dubbed, my friend's eyesight is going.
>>70764217
Here's the list:
Back from the Dead (1957) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050157)
Bedlam (1946) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038343)
The Black Cat (1941) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033397)
The Body Snatcher (1945) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037549)
Carnival of Souls (1962) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055830)
Cat People (1942) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034587)
The City of the Dead aka Horror Hotel (1960) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053719)
The Curse of the Cat People (1944) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036733)
Curse of the Demon (1957) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050766)
Dead of Night (1945) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037635)
The Ghost Ship (1943) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035937)
The Haunting (1963) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057129)
House of Darkness (1948) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040452)
House on Haunted Hill (1959) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051744)
I Bury the Living (1958) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051755)
I Walked With a Zombie (1943) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036027)
The Innocents (1961) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055018)
Isle of the Dead (1945) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037820)
The Lady of Death (1946) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038445)
The Leopard Man (1943) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036104)
Mr. Sardonicus (1961) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055200)
A Place of One's Own (1945) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037179)
The Seventh Victim (1943) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036341)
The Uninvited (1944) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037415)
>>70764177
I love the sublety of the old horrors, like Cat People. It's largely in the imagination and is open to interpretation.
>>70764217
That's the trouble with Night of the Demon. It's shown as supernatural right from the start when the critic guy gets killed. The monster should have been offscreen until the final reveal and the death left open - could have been an accident hitting the electrical pole.
>>70764264
Exactly. You don't know if it is supernatural or not for at least the first half of the film, sometimes not until the end.
In _Danse Macabre_, Stephen King singled out Lewton for particular praise.
The 1960s version of The Haunting is great. Genuinely scary.
>>70764329
I watched the Curse of the Demon version; you don't think of it supernatural from the get-go.
Fun fact: Kate Bush sampled "It's in the trees! It's coming!" for her song "Hounds of Love" in 1985. That line also gets used in one of the Johannes Cabal books.
>>70764392
>Scandal, murder, insanity, suicide!
Such a great movie.
Kubrick nicked the music and unsetlling horror of the corridor for the Shining from this film.
Also Scorsese lifted a little trick with the police man who had the thumb brace flipping to another hand for one shot, when he done the same thing in Shutter Island with the glass of water
>>70763816
I wouldn't say Night of the Demon is scary or unsettling, but I do love the atmosphere.
And Karswell is magnificent bastard.
>>70764416
Shit, those shots of the demon in the distance rushing forwards scared the hell out of me as a kid
>>70763925
I Walked with a Zombie
Les Diaboliques
Haxan
Carnival of Souls
>>70764754
Based on Alesteir Crowley of course.
>>70763862
Oh shit, yeah. Same basic story.
>>70764217
>no atom age vampires
Any reason why?
>>70765762
Because those movies tend to be MST3k fodder. And shit.
>>70766309
>shit
Not all of them
>>70766446
Counterexamples?
>>70763816
Eyes With Out A Face
Repulsion
Night and Fog
M
The Collector
At Midnight I Take Your Soul
Freaks
>>70766616
I Vampiri
Curse of the Demon is fucking awesome.
