Burnt Offerings

I thought this movie was alright being that it was my first time watching it. It's not anything like the horror movies of today because it obviously relies on an interesting story and creepiness; something Hollywood often does with special effects. This is just a creepy film and runs a bit slow at the beginning but it builds up towards an alright ending. Burnt Offerings is your typical "family buys/rents dream house at bargain price only to regret it" film. Obvious examples being "The Shining" and the "Amityville Horror," both based on books as well. There is also a strange person hidden away upstairs (c.f. Jane Eyre, The Old Dark House, The Ghoul (1975) etc).

The film is a study of family dysfunction, which is exacerbated by the haunted house (see also the first two films mentioned above). Issues explored include child beating, marital stress and breakdown, the importance/impotence of the father figure, and estrangement between all family members.

The most visible manifestation of the "evil" is the ability of the house to clean and repair itself. Unfortunately this is more of a householders dream than nightmare. No more breakages, tidying, "cowboy" building firms, etc. When Ben Rolf appears in a wheelchair, thus emulating Arnold Allardyce at the start, I thought the house was trying to "keep" rather than kill its occupants. The house needed a specific family imprisoned from which to draw its power/feed off. Thus the Alladyces were victims of the house. Their behavior at the start and motivation was of fear and escape. There lays their need to find a replacement family and sudden departure. However, the ending shows the couple to be in league with the evil, my initial impression being wrong.

The conclusion was too open-ended, the origins and mysteries of the house were not fully explained. Perhaps the source novel is clearer. The title, Burnt Offerings, seems a misnomer, nothing is burnt per se. The house itself was the offering; the family had high expectations, only to be fatally disappointed.

Remember Dark Shadows? Of course you do! But do you remember the movie Night Of Dark Shadows, released after the tv series went off the air? If you've seen that movie and then watch Burnt Offerings, you may have noticed quite a few similarities, especially at the end. That's because both movies were directed by Dan Curtis, but whereas Night Of Dark Shadows was anything but scary, Burnt Offerings conquers the list of haunted house stories by being everything NODS wasn't. By replacing the cast with superior actors, coming up with a mostly new script, new plot and forgetting all about Dark Shadows, except for some of the recognizable music, Curtis came up with a horror movie that scared even the goosebumps on my skin.

Here's the plot in a nutshell: Oliver Reed and Karen Black play Marion and Ben Rolf, who along with Ben's aunt Elizabeth (played superbly by Bette Davis) and the Rolfs' son, agree to pay $900.00 and take care of an 85-year-old woman in exchange for living in a decaying old mansion on a large estate for the summer. There are several clues about what they're in for right at the beginning, such as Ben and Marion viewing about a dozen pictures of the house, all from the same angle and each picture showing the house looking exactly the same even though there's over one hundred years separating the first picture from the most recent.

Ben begins seeing one of the most horrifying characters in horror movies, someone he'd repeatedly dreamed about following his mother's death years earlier. Marion seems to become possessed by the house, and aunt Elizabeth seems to grow weaker by the scene. And the slightest injury to any of the characters seems to cause part of the estate to become like new. The ending, although similar to that in Night Of Dark Shadows, is a hundred times more frightening and will be long remembered afterwards. Though released in 1976, Burnt Offerings is a classic horror movie that can still scare viewers today, partly because the scare factor is not dependent on virtually non-existent special effects or loads of blood and gore, but instead is supported by a fantastic script and the ability of its stars to utilize their talents. The Haunting has nothing on this film.

Remember Dark Shadows? Of course you do! But do you remember the movie Night Of Dark Shadows, released after the tv series went off the air? If you've seen that movie and then watch Burnt Offerings, you may have noticed quite a few similarities, especially at the end. That's because both movies were directed by Dan Curtis, but whereas Night Of Dark Shadows was anything but scary, Burnt Offerings conquers the list of haunted house stories by being everything NODS wasn't. By replacing the cast with superior actors, coming up with a mostly new script, new plot and forgetting all about Dark Shadows, except for some of the recognizable music, Curtis came up with a horror movie that scared even the goosebumps on my skin.

Here's the plot in a nutshell: Oliver Reed and Karen Black play Marion and Ben Rolf, who along with Ben's aunt Elizabeth (played superbly by Bette Davis) and the Rolfs' son, agree to pay $900.00 and take care of an 85-year-old woman in exchange for living in a decaying old mansion on a large estate for the summer. There are several clues about what they're in for right at the beginning, such as Ben and Marion viewing about a dozen pictures of the house, all from the same angle and each picture showing the house looking exactly the same even though there's over one hundred years separating the first picture from the most recent.

Ben begins seeing one of the most horrifying characters in horror movies, someone he'd repeatedly dreamed about following his mother's death years earlier. Marion seems to become possessed by the house, and aunt Elizabeth seems to grow weaker by the scene. And the slightest injury to any of the characters seems to cause part of the estate to become like new. The ending, although similar to that in Night Of Dark Shadows, is a hundred times more frightening and will be long remembered afterwards. Though released in 1976, Burnt Offerings is a classic horror movie that can still scare viewers today, partly because the scare factor is not dependent on virtually non-existent special effects or loads of blood and gore, but instead is supported by a fantastic script and the ability of its stars to utilize their talents. The Haunting has nothing on this film.