Movie Type: Haunted House Film, Supernatural Horror
Themes: Demonic Possession, Ghosts
Main Cast: Karen Black, Oliver Reed, Burgess Meredith, Eileen Heckart, Lee Montgomery, Bette Davis
Release Year: 1976
Country: US
Run Time: 116 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
Dan Curtis, director of TV's Dark Shadows series, directed this eerie haunted-house thriller about a house which draws energy from its inhabitants and selects its own "keeper" from the family of Ben and Marian Rolf (Oliver Reed & Karen Black), who rent the strangely-affordable house one fateful summer then find themselves slowly succumbing to its creepy powers. The photography is suitably moody, and many of the standard haunted-house cliches are used to decent effect -- particularly a violent scene in which the surrounding woods form a barrier to prevent the family station wagon from escaping the area -- but the pace is too leisurely overall, climaxing with the type of grim ending employed by nearly every mainstream horror film in the late 70's. Black's spooky looks are used to maximum effect, but are never quite as chilling as the final shot of Curtis's TV movie Trilogy of Terror from the previous year. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
Review
This underrated chiller is worthy of rediscovery by the horror fans who missed it the first time. Those who expect a zippy pace and shocking twists need not apply -- the film's "evil house" plot is pretty archetypal stuff and the one real twist at the end isn't terribly difficult to predict. However, these elements hardly matter in Burnt Offerings: co-writer/director Dan Curtis knows the real horror of this tale lies in helplessly watching an innocent family unit breaking down as it is preyed upon by an unseen evil. As a result, he wisely concentrates on the family drama angle of the story and allows the tension to build in a slow, methodical fashion that makes the handful of shock scenes genuinely unsettling. He also layers on plenty of brooding atmosphere and is ably aided in this aim by his technical crew's efforts: Jacques Marquette's gauzy cinematography brings out the antiquarian creepiness of the film's setting and Robert Cobert's blood-and-thunder score adds some musical exclamation points to the film's set pieces. Burnt Offerings also benefits from a well-chosen cast: Oliver Reed, Karen Black, and Bette Davis all share a natural intensity in their acting styles and that intensity is given a great vehicle here as each character is slowly but surely driven mad by the house's diabolical machinations. In the end, Burnt Offerings is probably a bit too methodical in its pacing for viewers accustomed to slam-bang approach of post-'70s horror fare but seasoned horror fans will find plenty to enjoy in this film's subtle charms. ~ Donald Guarisco, All Movie Guide
Dub Taylor - Walker; Anthony James - Chauffeur; Orin Cannon - Minister; Todd Turquand - Young Ben; Joseph Riley - Ben's Father; Jim Myers - Dr. Ross
Credit
Ann Roth - Costume Designer, Dan Curtis - Director, Dennis Virkler - Editor, Robert Cobert - Composer (Music Score), Eugène Lourié - Production Designer, Stevan Larner - Cinematographer, Jacques Marquette - Cinematographer, Dan Curtis - Producer, Robert Singer - Producer, Solomon Brewer - Set Designer, William F. Nolan - Screenwriter, Dan Curtis - Screenwriter, Robert Marasco - Book Author
Burnt Offerings is a 1976 horror film based on the 1973 novel of the same name by Robert Marasco. It is about a family who moves into a haunted house that rejuvenates itself with each death that occurs inside of it. The film stars Karen Black, Oliver Reed, and Bette Davis and was directed by Dan Curtis.
The Rolf family takes a vacation from the city (the specific city is not identified in the film) at a large Victorian mansion in the California countryside. The family consists of Marian (Karen Black) and husband Ben (Oliver Reed), their young son David (Lee Montgomery), and their elderly aunt Elizabeth (Bette Davis). The owners of the house are the Allardyce siblings, brother Arnold and sister Roz, played by actors Burgess Meredith and Eileen Heckart, respectively. The Allardyces appear at the beginning of the film when they inform their new tenants of a particularly odd requirement for their rental: the Allardyce's elderly mother continues to live in her upstairs room and the Rolfs are required to provide her with food during their stay. The siblings explain that the old woman is obsessed with privacy and will probably not interact with them, so the food is to be left outside her door.
As it turns out, this task falls to the mother who quickly succumbs to the allure of the ornate Victorian house and its period decor. Various "accidents" occur during the summer, including the suspicious death of the renters' Aunt Elizabeth. As the film progresses, Ben becomes increasingly depressed and anxious while Marian becomes increasingly obsessed with the house, the old woman in the attic, and all of the Victorian artifacts. It gradually becomes clear that Marian is somehow being possessed or controlled by the house and that a malevolent force is slowly consuming the whole family. At the climax of the movie, the house kills Ben and David, Marian "becomes" the old woman in the attic. The film ends with the house fully rejuvenated and glistening like new. The Allardyce siblings, who have not been seen since the beginning of the film, return and marvel at the house's beauty. We also notice that pictures of the family have been added to a large table covered with portrait-photographs going back many years, implying that the house's regeneration process is as old as the house itself and that the Rolfs were simply the latest victims.
Although Dunsmuir House was used as a model for the Allardyce Mansion, artificial 'wear-and-tear' on the actual structure was necessary prior to the building's complete "rejuvenation": The real place was dressed to look as if the fictitious place had peeling paint, overgrown weeds, and various cracked walls; the outdoor swimming pool is likewise dressed, and drained at the beginning of the story, then cleaned, repaired of its cracks, and refilled with chlorinated water; during a rainstorm, the roof sheds its worn-out shingles and new ones materialize underneath; likewise, the disintegrating chimney rids its outer weathered-brick 'shell.'
An artificial wave machine was used in the sequence in which the pool water suddenly turns choppy and almost drowns the boy.
Variations from the novel
The novel's vacationing family are from Queens and the fictional Allardyce mansion is located somewhere in the Peconic Bay area of Long Island, New York, whereas in the film the family is from California and the Allardyce mansion is in California as well.
The rusty tricycle shown briefly in the film's graveyard sequence is described in the novel as being splattered with blood.
The endings of the novel and film adaptation differ; while Marian Rolf does become Mrs. Allardyce in both versions, the novel has Davey drowning in the pool with Ben dying from a brain hemmorage at the same time while Marian watches through a window, desperately attempting to reach them.
