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Eleanor in the haunting of Hill House
Eleanor in the haunting of Hill House
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Shirley Jackson’s 1959 novel The Haunting of Hill House introduces the frightening idea of supernatural manifestations to an audience who had never experienced a novel quite like this one. The novel presents ideas that were left to the audiences’ interpretation without blatantly explaining that Hill House is the home to many paranormal entities that haunt Eleanor Vance. Wise’s production uses psychological thrill tactics in conjunction with Nelson Gidding’s screenplay being an exact transcription of the novel, leaving the interpretation of the film up to the audience. De Bont’s 1999 film reveals Hill House’s secret by overusing modern-day computer graphics to create paranormal manifestations within Hill House, pushing the supernatural aspect of the novel instead of leaving behind ambiguous ideas. In Jackson’s novel, Eleanor’s journey begins early in the morning, her sister trying to keep her from taking the car with a guilt trip while Wise presents the same idea to closely follow with the novel. Whereas this particular scene in de Bont’s adaptation plays out in a quick manner with very little attention paid to Eleanor’s journey to Hill House. Both films were made to appeal to different types of audiences with one being considered a cult classic while the other was made to appeal to the horror fanatics of the 1990s. Wise uses Eleanor’s journey to introduce the main protagonist to the audience, creating a background for Nell while de Bont ignores the importance of the journey, following with Jackson’s strong belief in the occult.
The juxtaposition of the film adaptations discloses the opposite ideals of directors Robert Wise and Jan de Bont. The latter introduces the house as a living being without using a hint of mystery, openly ...
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...adaptation, Wise and Jackson both kill the main protagonist by way of suicide while in de Bont’s production, the house accepts Eleanor as its very own.
Works Cited
de Bont, Jan, dir. The Haunting. Dreamworks, 1999. Film. 9 Mar 2014.
Jackson, Shirley. The Haunting of Hill House. New York, New York: Penguin Group, 1959. Print.
Kael, Pauline. "Are Movies Going to Pieces?." Atlantic. 01 Nov 1964: n. page. Web. 9 Apr. 2014. .
Keenan, Richard. The Films of Robert Wise. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, 2007. 120-127. Print.
Schwarzbaum, Lisa. "Movie Review: The Haunting." Entertainment Weekly. 30 Jul 1999: n. page. Web. 9 Apr. 2014. .
Wise, Robert, dir. The Haunting. Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, 1963. Film. 25 Apr 2014
The house Sylvie attempts to "keep" must accommodate change including the peace and threat implied by nothingness. "A house should be built to float cloud high, if need be...A house should have a compass and a keel" (184). Rather than being seduced by the ultimate and final separation of nothingness, Ruth learns (as a transient) that housekeeping can be an expansive and inclusive method of engaging and interpreting the world.
“Things in the world even those built by man are so quiet left to themselves…” People futilely fight the decay of life and relationships in an attempt to find beauty and goodness in the world. Joyce Carol Oates masterfully illustrates this theme in her short story “Haunted.” Oates reveals the protagonist Melissa’s desperate struggle with looming forces like the physical environment, her twisted relationship with her best friend, and even the insanity in her own mind.
When Charlotte first arrives at the house she says “A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say a haunted house” (Stetson, 647). Immediately when Charlotte arrives she begins
Description of the house follows, very high ceilings, old mansion it seems, with chimney stains, it has been let go. Jumps in time to narrators ex-husband making fun of narrators fantasizing about stains. The next paragraph is the father in a retirement home, always referring to things: ‘The Lord never intended’. This shows how old people have disdain for new things, the next generation appears to be more and more sacreligious. Shows streak of meanness when ‘spits’ out a reference to constant praying, narrator claims he does not know who he is talking to, but appears to be the very pious mother.
Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll House. The Bedford Introduction to Drama. Ed. Lee A. Jacobus. Boston: Bedford/ST. Martin’s, 2001. 659 – 688.
The two who live there are brother and sister. The brother enjoys french literature, while the sister enjoys knitting. One day the brother heard a noise in their house and thought it was someone/something trying to take over their house. He shut the door to the side of the house that he heard the noise and told his sister that their house was being taken over. A few days or so later he hears a similar noise and decides they need to get out of the house so he takes his sister and moves out onto the street. In The Fall of the House of Usher, the gothic style is portrayed when the man's twin sister comes back from the "dead" and attacks her brother. In House Taken Over, mythical realism is shown in the brother hearing things in the house. He fantasizes all of the noises there isn't really anybody/anything there. The two stories both involve a brother and sister who like is the same house. The stories are both very interesting to read.The stories portray their genres very well. I like the gothic style more than the magical realism
Ibsen, Henrik. The Project Gutenberg EBook of a Doll's House. [EBook #2542]. The Project Gutenberg, 13 Dec. 2008. Web. 14 Mar. 2011. .
During the mid and late 1970’s, the mood of American films shifted sharply. People needed to get away from such negative memories as the Vietnam War, long gas lines, the resignation of President Nixon, and ...
Stanley, Robert H. The Movie Idiom: Film as a Popular Art Form. Illinois: Waveland Press, Inc. 2011. Print
Federico Garcia Lorca's “The House of Bernarda Alba” and Henrik Ibsen's “A Doll's House” both protest against the confinement of women of their days. Although the Houses are set differently in Spain of 20th century and Norway of 19th century respectively, both the plays relate in illuminating their respective female protagonists, Adela and Nora, as they eventually develop a sense of individuality and self-expression and emerge as free individuals from repression. The authors’ attempts allow the reader audience to gain an insight into the social norms that each protagonist was pitted against. This heightens the tension as the action develops.
It was a late Friday night when the Montgomery family saw Fairview’s welcome sign. Their valise bounced up and down as they drove on the rocky roads of Fairview. It was exactly eight o’clock when they drove into their driveway. As they got into their new home, they noticed all the cracks on the walls, dusty floors, and mice running everywhere. They started unpacking and cleaning until Jessica, the oldest child, noticed a strange man like shadow outside
Throughout the novel “Beloved”, Toni Morrison who is the author used the setting of this book to keep the reader not only engaged but lost and thrown into an alien environment. By using the past and giving the reader pieces of the past to show why the future begins to alter. Along with Toni’s use of setting, she also gave a special significance for the ghost in house 124.
Eleanor Vance the conventional gothic heroine of the tale Haunting of Hill House falls victim to Hill House when forced to leave and detach herself from it. Hill House both gives Eleanor a medium to fall victim to it and uses its own traumatic history to manifest as irrational behavior and personality to play on Eleanor’s vulnerabilities and insecurities. Hill House targets these traits of Eleanor and heightens the sensitivity around them both with the thoughts of the people she has living around her and the house itself. In Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House one witlessness the conventional gothic heroine Eleanor Vance become a victim to Hill House. However, she is not victimized by a conventional gothic villain but is instead triggered
"Realism and the Significance of A Doll's House." Wikispaces.com. Ed. Tangient LLC. Wikispaces, 2011. Web. 8 Apr. 2011. .
Barsam, Richard. Looking at Movies An Introduction to Film, Second Edition (Set with DVD). New York: W. W. Norton, 2006. Print.