The Shuttered Room

(UK - 1967)

The Shuttered Room was a horror ahead of it’s time, and though it doesn’t really work as a whole, it’s nonetheless one of creepiest movies out there. Bob Clark’s Black Christmas from 1974 & John Carpenter’s Halloween from 1978 are generally credited with starting the killer’s POV shot, but we get a mysterious and chilling attack right off the bat in David Greene’s unheralded 1967 chiller! Marked by a series of fluid POV shots, alternately ripe with lust and menace, this early effort is still one of the most psychologically effecting mixes of voyeurism and violence.

The filmmaking technique is way ahead of the material, and despite Ken Hodges expert cinematography, the actual highlight may be Basil Kirchin’s equally groundbreaking eclectic and experimental jazz score that dominates the quiet film. Kirchin is a father of ambient music whose life work has been creating a new musical language, a sort of sound within sound that essentially breaks down and recombines every sort of instrument and sound effect until their blend creates a very personal and emotional sound never heard before. Unfortunately, his Worlds Within Worlds releases are so unique the record companies that promise him complete artistic freedom soon turn into Weinstein like geniuses; they know what works for “their” released version better than Kirchin, who winds up starting over again since the record company owns his master recordings. In Worlds Within Worlds, Kirchin combines the instruments of jazz, rock, and a classical orchestra with everything from animal shrieks to insect chirps to autistic children, altering the speed to suit the feelings he’s portraying. Kirchin’s Shuttered Room score obviously isn’t on that level, but the moody soprano sax solo is priceless, and his harpsichord work isn’t far behind, which says a lot considering he’s first and foremost a drummer! The emotional intensity of the film, which is extremely personal despite the characters being ciphers, is almost solely derived from Kirchin’s soundscape.

Though filmed in Cornwall, England, this H.P. Lovecraft adaptation is typically set in New England. Shuttered Room is a backwoods gothic that takes place on an obscure and desolate island still lacking electricity despite having power lines on the main roads and many of their workers helping funnel the juice to the big city. 21-year-old native Susannah (Carol Lynley) returns with her new, much older magazine editor husband Mike Kelton (Gig Young), purportedly to turn the childhood home she just inherited, a creepy mill that essentially hasn’t been touched since Susannah left 17-years-ago, into their summer house. However, vulnerable innocent Susannah has been haunted by her past since being sent away at age 4, and Mike hopes by confronting it they’ll find the key to unlock her childhood mysteries that result in frequent panic attacks

With a pretty young blonde lusted after by all the crude and rowdy local men who are tired of the less appealing neighborhood tart and thus resentful of the new babe’s out of place intellectual husband, the film reeks of Straw Dogs right from the outset except it predates the Sam Peckinpah masterpiece by four years. Sordid unruly roughneck Ethan (Oliver Reed more or less reprising his role in Joseph Losey’s These Are The Damned) leads the band of grinning brainless yokels, practically trying to rape his cousin Susannah from the moment he lays eyes on her. One of the greatest examples of Ken Hodges peering camera has lecher Ethan peering at an undressing Susannah through her dollhouse window. Reed’s unsettling depraved glare is certainly the most effective aspect of his manic and maniacal scenery chewing performance.

There are several presences watching both the Kelton’s and the locals. They include strange and secretive Aunt Agatha (Flora Robson). Often perched on her watchtower and sporting a pet eagle, she’s overseer and controller of the mysterious evil locked in the eponymous room.

Mike is a wise city boy who thumbs his nose at the local hicks superstitions and bludgeons them into place with his karate chops. It’s one thing for the educated metropolitans to ignore the warnings of every single dumb superstitious bumpkin - including a welder who was lucky to only lose an eye - that you will die if you spend even one night in the accursed mill. However, rational human beings don’t make a habit of remaining in a place where they are menaced from the first second. The oblivious Kelton’s not only don’t seem to mind, they apparently have amnesia, as they are even friendly and helpful to their tormentors the next time they see them. For instance, Mike gives a rowdy uncouth thug a lift in his swanky ’67 T-Bird only to be led to a roadblock ambush.

The Shuttered Room was actually written by Lovecraft’s publisher August Derleth based on his late friend’s concept and notes. Though Lovecraft is notoriously difficult to render on film (especially since he contends that entities which cannot be perceived by the five senses becomes impossible to quantify and accurately describe), Shuttered Room at least deals with his classic themes of hereditary disorder and deteriorating mental health. Unfortunately, it does so in a pretty retarded manner.

In a sense, all the menace in Shuttered Room is provided by aimless youth lashing out because that’s the only way they know to act. Unfortunately, the story lacks a single legitimate character with any semblance of logic, depth, or motivation. It’s almost surreal in this sense, like watching one of those bizarre giallos where the killer seems to draw all sorts of attractive women into his path as if through some unspoken gravitational force. The dialogue is pretty worthless, and to make things worse since they refused to relocate the film to Norfolk, England where they shot it, a bunch of Brits (the entire cast other than Young & Lynley) are forced to make failed attempts at faking a New England accent.

Though Lovecraft’s stories are at least good in their intended medium, I’m only concerned that a horror film holds my interest. A good horror film is generally one that’s consistently intriguing despite probably being a shallow genre exercise, which still disqualifies 98% of the genre. Though The Shuttered Room’s story is thin and the big revelation is about what you figured all along, the filmmaking is consistently exciting. It’s almost amazing how much mileage they get out of acoustic string plucking and ominous spying POV shots considering the entire film is shot in broad daylight with no lighting or post production effects. Greene’s creepy foreboding work makes expert use of the eerie dilapidated locale, nosy camera angles, and expressive soundtrack, resulting in an effecting work where every frame spills over with tension.

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