The Uninvited (1944)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

The Uninvited (1944) – L. Allen

I keep returning to this film because I want it to be something that it is not.  I want it to be a spooky supernatural ghost story, along the lines of The Haunting (1963), and although it does include all the elements from the haunted house genre, the tone of the film consistently undercuts its spookiness.  For one thing, there is Ray Milland, constantly joking and not really taking the supernatural (sobbing from somewhere in the dark house, sudden cold spots or a whiff of mimosas, doors slamming) seriously at all.  His sister, with whom Milland has bought the house on the clifftop overlooking the sea on a whim, is a bit more concerned.  But the film jauntily moves along (with some mickey-mousing on the soundtrack) to focus on a burgeoning romance between Milland (aged 38) and Gail Russell (aged 20), who is the daughter of the woman who used to live in the house who died mysteriously, falling from the cliff.  It is the mother who is thought to haunt the house -- but this doesn’t quite jell because of the malevolence of the spirit toward Russell.  A seance is held to try to sort it all out and the plot thickens considerably (including the introduction of a possible lesbian subplot).  With all these classic ingredients, The Uninvited should be a spine-tingling ghost story but instead it becomes a fantasy film (save for one “angry ghost” scene), offering hope for romance if only the secret of the ghost can be worked out and Russell freed from its curse.  And approached with these different expectations, the film works.

Earlier, I wrote more pithily:

Ray Milland plays a 30-something jovial oaf who moves into a haunted house with his sister and puts the moves on a 20-year-old neighbor girl who is the target of the ghost's energies. Generally lighthearted and romantic but with some good (and not overdone) chills (room gets colder, pets won't go in there). Solving the mystery of the ghost's back-story means saving the girl.