Ghosts of Hanley House (1968) User Reviews

Very Obscure Ghost Story

[Tommy-5 · 5/10 · 21 November 2002]

I make it a point to be kind to films such as this one, but truth be told Ghosts of Hanley House is really not very good. Poor production values and at times downright bad acting make it so. Still, the quality of this film is not what makes it interesting to film buffs such as myself. I purchased my video copy from Sinister Cinema and one wonders where (Sinister's owner) Greg Luce obtained a print. Ghosts of Hanley House is perhaps the most obscure film I have ever been able to add to my library and I have many. It is not catalogued in any of my reference books. Sinister Cinema says this film was shot in Texas but does not say where.

Shot in 1968 with unknown players, Ghosts of Hanley House intrigues in it's own way. I tried in vain to recognize the town where the beginning scenes were filmed and I would love to know where the house was/is located and it's history. Were it not for the capable Mr. Luce this may have become one of the truly lost films. The plot is standard enough but does have an interesting twist and it is sad this could not have been produced on a bigger budget. Mood music is totally inappropriate in many places and the use of lingering, isolated head shots are overdone, to where it is obvious they are what they are: fill to pad out the running time. Several people spend the night in Hanley House, said to be haunted. We have the usual standard chills and unexplained noises until we are about 3/4 the way into the story, then the story turns to whatever uniqueness it possesses. We learn that the ghosts are murdered victims of one of the persons who are spending the night in Hanley House and have been trying all along to lure him there. Of course, he meets with the stock bad ending and the ghosts depart the house, supposedly never to return. As I said, production values were not good. Lighting was poor, camera angles seemed cramped, and the day for night shots were painfully obvious. Still, one has to view a film such as this within it's own context and by those standards, this flick is interesting. If you, as I, are interested in the obscure, particularly the obscure ghost story, then this is for you. (In fairness I've commented before that it is hard for anybody to do a good ghost story). This is exactly the kind of film that persons such as we spend many happy hours searching for. This would not be a good film to recommend to the general viewer. So . . . having said all this, what are you waiting for? Order your copy today and watch it late after everyone else is asleep. If you are interested enough to do that after reading this review, you won't be disappointed

Odd Film, but not so great

[artpf · 3/10 · 8 January 2014]

Five people are spending the night in a haunted house. Things get dicey when some of them start turning up decapitated.

Odd film that I had never heard of before watching it on Cult O Rama on my Roku. Filled with unknowns who had very limited film exposure before or after.

One of the actresses was married to Timothy Leary!

Another made a few soft core porns after this film.

The director acting in 2 films but never directed again.

I'm always fascinated about how these movies get made and why the people involved have such a limited career.

The movie is the typical ghost house fare and don't expect great acting. The sound is horrible. Tinny and echoing. Slow exposition. And be prepared for the car key questioning. It seems to go on for 20 minutes!

They all get drunk and play cards and then the record player comes out. Plenty of laffing for no reason and dancing. Then there is what I guess is a wolf only it sure sounds human. Oh, and the black widow spider episode! Hysterical.

It's not a very good film, so maybe I answered my own question about why these people had limited careers. The biggest problem with this film is that it just keeps going with nothing really happening.

For a cheap and crappy film, it's not bad...

[planktonrules · 3/10 · 20 September 2011]

The folks who make "The Ghosts of Hanley House" obviously had little idea of what they were doing. The acting, at times, is abominable. The direction and camera-work are not a lot better than a home movie. And, the sound is really, really bad--with goofy music and sound effects as well as voices that seem to have been stuck on haphazardly after the fact--and they are often out of synchronization. Plus the sound quality is just awful--making it tough, at times, to understand the actors. All this is readily apparent--which makes me wonder why I bothered sticking with this film. In hindsight, I am still not 100% sure--I must have assumed it could only get better.

The film plays like a long version of an urban legend. Some rich guy promises to give another guy a brand-new Ferrari if he'll just stay overnight in the Hanley House and prove that there are no ghosts. It's obvious why he's going to the house--he'll get a great new car. But why four others agree to go as well confused me a bit--what's in it for them? And, when folks started dying, you aren't exactly surprised.

So what's the verdict? Well, the movie is very badly made. But, if you are crazy enough to stick with it, you'll see that for a crappy film it's not all that bad. It does offer a few frights and they seemed to make the most of their $74 budget. However, it's not bad enough to make it a must-see for bad film fanatics--it's just somewhat bad! By the way, pay attention at about 33 minutes into the film. Be sure to look for the strings pulling the picture off the wall!

Obscure and weird ghost story

[Hessian499 · 10 July 2004]

As others have said, this film deals with people trying to stay overnight in a house that has a reputation of being extremely haunted. While obviously made on a shoestring budget with unknown actors, this film has does some good points. The house itself is a neat setting with loads of strange pieces of artwork and gothic furniture. The storyline has echoes of other ghost tales, but the plot twists towards the end add some surprises to the story. The actors are not Academy Award contenders, but do an adequate job with the limited roles given to them; the young woman who plays Sheila probably gives the best performance and is quite pretty as well. However, there are also a lot of faults with this film, as the sound is particularly bad in places, there are weird sidelines to the plot that are incomprehensible, and the story as a whole seems implausible from start to finish. Having said that, this may appeal to some viewers who enjoy ghost stories or like to watch obscure films from the past.

A stinker with a little something

[jonfrum2000 · 2/10 · 21 October 2010]

This is a bad movie. Badly made, that is, and not 'so bad that it's good' bad. That being said, I did keep returning to it until I had seen the end. It appears to be made by someone who had been around movie sets but really didn't know what they were doing. As another reviewer mentioned, the camera lingers on face shots for a painfully long time for no apparent reason. Sound doesn't always sync up with the picture, and it's difficult to figure whether the sounds you're hearing are soundtrack or are being heard by the characters. A woman character screams bloody murder, and no one comes out of their rooms until a minute later.

For all that, it does have a perverse charm that kept me coming back 20 minutes at a time until the end. It's like watching the first student film of someone who later became a famous director. There's something there under the poor camera technique, editing and wooden acting. The total lack of humor - intended or otherwise - keeps this one out of the midnight movie/so bad that it's good genre, but if low budget haunted house movies appeal to you, this one might be worth a look. Don't pay for it - I downloaded it from the Internet Archive.

Eerie sounds from the past liven up this $1.98 horror film.

[mark.waltz · 3/10 · 13 October 2018]

Looking like some freshman film student's first project (aided with advice from a senior film student friend), this underground film has moments of shear headache inducing silence then a sudden switch to where the film comes alive. A cast of amateurs do their best to stay serious, showing their lack of acting skills, but as a result, the film never strays into a series of unintentional laughs. It's another saga of complete strangers making a bet to spend the night in an alleged haunted house where they are confronted by restless spirits longing to be free from wandering the halls where a brutal massacre took place. Atmospheric photography makes up for the excruciating low budget, and every now and then there are some genuine thrilling and frightening moments. It takes quite a bit of patience and determination to get through it, but 3/4 of the way through, I realized how glad I was to be able to stick with it. Would I rush to recommend this to friends? No. But I don't think I'd risk losing them as friends if they did watch it. Would I watch this again? Maybe in a few years just to see some of the technical elements I missed and experience some frights I didn't catch onto the first time around.

Nice try, underwhelming results

[ofumalow · 4/10 · 22 June 2019]

Note: The current IMBD plot description "Five people are spending the night in a haunted house. Things get dicey when some of them start turning up decapitated" is only half-right--the second sentence is very inaccurate and misleading.

This is a game low-budget regional attempt to do a traditional "haunted house challenge" story a la "The Haunting," et al. But it's undone not so much by the low budget as unimaginative direction and lack of atmosphere. (Admittedly, the soft, probably TV-copied prints this movie can be seen in probably don't help.) You know the handling will be somewhat clunky right off with some poor matching of shots including day-for-night ones. Otherwise the film makes a semi-intelligent decision to keep things relatively dark (hiding production shortcomings) and avoid overt violence, but there just isn't much sense of style or idiosyncrasy to the direction to convey any real sense of threat. Too many of the "scares" are in the form of crude sound effects obviously dubbed in later, and which the adequate (for this kind of movie) actors seldom react to at all. There's so little attempt to ratchet up suspense that when "The End" comes, it's one of those times you think "Wait--that was IT?" Not because things didn't happen, but because their presentation is so flat there's no sense of having reached a story's climax. Anyway, you've certainly seen worse, and this is notable for not being particularly lurid or cheesy in an era when most low-budget horror was exactly that. But it just doesn't really come to life. Compare it to another low-budget film from just a few years later like "Let's Scare Jessica to Death," and you can see how an ability to convey an unsettled atmosphere makes all the difference.

Almost Effective An An Experimental Ghost Film

[thalassafischer · 5/10 · 27 September 2023]

There was potential in Ghosts of Hanley House. Some parts are truly creepy just because of the atmosphere and eerie tone of the film. It reminds me a little bit of a modern found footage film, except actually quite spooky until ...

Our cast is awakened at 1 or 2 am by ghostly banging and then all decided to get fully dressed including necklaces, hair clips and neck ties before holding a seance. I know people used to dress up in public but give me a break. Even in the 60s people had tee shirts or could sit upright without a suit coat or hair accessories. Then they get lost in what is obviously Griffith Park in broad daylight meant to look "dark" because the film is black and white and they play crickets chirping in the background.

This film is very interesting from a sociological angle or as an historical artifact and it certainly has some atmosphere but you'll be disappointed if you pay attention too closely. I highly recommend playing this in the background at a Halloween party or watching it late at night in the dark alone. It's too ridiculous otherwise.

Excellent and Suspenseful Horror

[moonmonday · 8/10 · 16 March 2014]

This film won't be for everyone, but I found it to be extremely effective in building tension and being eerie and unsettling. I was frankly a bit frightened at some parts, and I felt that the film did an excellent job of keeping me in its grip of mystery throughout.

Aside from a very few elements I felt might have been more effective if done differently, I think this is one of the best and most undeservedly overlooked films that I've ever seen. Certainly the acting isn't all stellar by everyone involved, but it's solid enough and especially considering the small cast are enough to carry the film for its running time. There's a ring of distinct realism about the feel of the film, which is one of the reasons why I liked it so much: it's easy to believe that things happened this way, and no-one was particularly overwrought in their performance.

Definitely check this out if you like tense, creepy, genuinely scary stories of haunting. It's a familiar story, of people spending a night in a supposedly haunted house, who doubt there is anything to it at first, but they begin to reconsider as the night goes on. I wasn't expecting to be as engaged -- or as unsettled -- as I was by this film. Superb.

Curse of the terrible script.

[agamemnon3 · 7/10 · 10 December 2005]

This mediocre ghost story is made viable and creepy by a few subtle touches. The special effects are a mix of dry ice and what appears to be more dry ice, but the lighting is at times interesting. The cast members have stark and/or dark features, and the B&W medium in combination with dramatic lighting for scenes within the haunted mansion make for a very good effect. You usually come to 'like' a character in a movie, and in this movie there isn't anyone to like. It seems that everyone is a dumb creep with some kind of motive. Just how much that works to the film's advantage, however, is difficult to say because it might be lost on a more casual viewer, but I think that it makes the story interesting. There are a few sidelines to the plot which were either never developed or lost to editing, but they are minor enough to not affect the continuity of the film. The screams are great. Hollywood just doesn't have screamers like it used to. I would recommend this movie, if you can find it.

Roberta Reeves

[Cristi_Ciopron · 9/10 · 10 February 2015]

A modernist, minimalist chiller, by someone with advanced cinema thinking, with an authentic art-house feel; a very enjoyable movie, exquisitely crafted, and also good-natured, the suspense is played straight, and this is one of the few horrors leaving the impression of having a director. 'They were evil in life, so they're evil in death.' 'Hanley' makes the impression of a movie that was actually thought out carefully, reasoned, crafted; and it's also a beautiful and heartfelt movie, much unlike anything else in the genre. The plot achieves a kind of reasonable quiet. The director has a very clear idea about the economy of the movie. The cast deserves our praise, they give likable performances, I enjoyed most the parapsychologist's, her character is knowledgeable and knows enough, but is nonetheless surprised by the turn of the events; the movie has an actual plot, and the use of the mundane and the casual is one of the strengths. To acknowledge that Louise Sherrill's movie is one of the best ever, is to be able to tell art from rubbish.

'The Haunting' meets 'Hillbillies in a Haunted House!'

[mlevans · 6/10 · 2 September 2007]

At its best, 'The Ghosts of Hanley House' has the feel of a poor man's 'The Haunting.' At its worst, it has the feel of the forgettable Ferlin Huskey (old-time country singer for those who don't know) vehicle, 'Hillbillies in a Haunted House.' Part of this feeling was due to the guy who took the bet to stay overnight in the house (don't know the actor's name since even IMDb doesn't know who played whom!) sounds JUST like old Ferlin … which is to say a Hillbilly country singer stuck in a haunted house!

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised. As others have said, the production values, at least as far as sound goes, are terrible! It sounds like a very, very early "talkie" from about 1929! I think the ghost was standing outside the house, holding the microphone in many scenes! The camera work, though, is quite good. The film almost seems to have a blue tint, as in silent film days…except of course the handful of somewhat overdone scenes of a man's silhouette standing outside the house with the picture in a gaudy blood-red tint. The house itself is wonderful. I suspect the availability of the house may have led to the movie. I can almost see Louise Sherrill visiting the house and going 'Dang! I've GOT to make a haunted house movie about this place!'

Sometimes Ms. Sherrill gets a little heavy-handed on making sure we understand what we're supposed to see. We hear and see cars trying to start for 30 seconds to show that the cars won't start. We have at least two looks out the front door, each 20-30 seconds of panning every inch of terrain just to show that no one was REALLY knocking on the front door. A few other things that don't add up would be the painting of Mrs. Hanley looking NOTHING like the flashback image of her, the haunted house scenes at the opening bearing little or no relation to the crime that had been committed there, etc.

Don't expect 'The Haunting' or 'The Shining.' If you like B horror, though, this one should be well worth viewing.

A nifty and enjoyably spooky regional horror obscurity

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 10 March 2008]

Five people decide to spend a whole evening at Hanley House, a creepy rundown abode with a notorious local reputation for being haunted. Pretty soon weird things begin to happen: Strange noises can be heard emanating from the basement, cars won't start, and otherworldly voices speak to a mental medium from the other dimension. Will our brave quintet survive the night and still be alive come dawn? Competently directed in a plain, straightforward manner by Louise Sherrill (who also wrote the tight, compelling script), with stark, grainy black and white cinematography by Claude Fullerton, acceptable acting from a game no-name cast, a spare, wonky, droning score by David C. Parsons, a suitably spooky atmosphere, and a groovy-rockin' R&B instrumental tune occasionally blasting away on the soundtrack, this fright feature makes for fun viewing. The dusty, desolate backwoods Texas setting adds some tasty regional flavor to the proceedings while the plot has a few nice twists and turns in it. While admittedly slow and talky in spots, the movie thankfully does improve and become more increasingly eerie and unsettling as it goes along. Fans of overlooked low-budget independent horror fare are advised to seek this one out.

Retro regional horror is okay of taken on its own terms

[dbborroughs · 6/10 · 3 November 2008]

Five people stay over night in Hanley House, a supposed Haunted Mansion that has been left sitting unoccupied since the Hanley's abruptly up and left years before, leaving all of their things behind. Good little horror film that was the sort of thing to play on the bottom of a drive-in multiple feature this is a movie that seems to have been about five to ten years out of date from when it was released-Its black and white and low on gore and monsters meaning it had nothing on the films that say Roger Corman was turning out, nor does it have the shock value of Night of the Living Dead. Clearly made on the cheap the film still manages to create some tension with its use of shadows and dry ice. The cast is game if uneven and all over the place. Its worth a look if you're in the mood for a retro-drive in night or want something more akin to the Haunting then something more graphic.