The Legend of Hell House

The Legend of Hell House
Theatrical poster
Directed by	John Hough
Produced by	Albert Fennell Norman T. Herman James H. Nicholson (executive) Susan Hart (executive)
Written by	Novel & screenplay: Richard Matheson
Starring	Pamela Franklin Roddy McDowall Clive Revill Gayle Hunnicutt Roland Culver Peter Bowles Michael Gough
Music by	Delia Derbyshire Brian Hodgson
Cinematography	Alan Hume
Edited by	Geoffrey Foot
Production company	Academy Pictures Corporation
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date	15 June 1973
Running time	95 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Box office	$2.5 million (US/ Canada rentals)

The Legend of Hell House is a 1973 British horror film directed by John Hough and based on the American novel Hell House by Richard Matheson, who also wrote the screenplay. The film stars Pamela Franklin, Roddy McDowall, Clive Revill, and Gayle Hunnicutt as a group of researchers who spend a week in a purportedly haunted English manor in which previous investigators were killed.

Physicist Lionel Barrett is enlisted by an eccentric millionaire, Mr. Deutsch, to make an investigation into "survival after death" in "the one place where it has yet to be refuted". This is the Belasco House, the "Mount Everest of haunted houses", originally owned by the notorious "Roaring Giant" Emeric Belasco, a six-foot-five perverted millionaire and supposed murderer, who disappeared soon after a massacre at his home. The house is believed to be haunted by numerous spirits, the victims of Belasco's twisted and sadistic desires.

Accompanying Barrett are his wife, Ann, as well as two mediums: a mental medium and Spiritualist minister, Florence Tanner, and a physical medium, Ben Fischer, who is the only survivor of an investigation 20 years previously. The rationalist Barrett is rudely sceptical of Tanner's belief in "surviving personalities", spirits which haunt the physical world, and he asserts that there is nothing but unfocused electromagnetic energy in the house. Barrett brings a machine he has developed, which he believes will rid the house of this energy.

Though not a physical medium, Tanner begins to manifest physical phenomena inside the house. When, after a quarrel with Tanner, Barrett is attacked by invisible forces, he suspects that Tanner may be using the house's energy against him. Meanwhile, Fischer remains aloof, with his mind closed to the house's influence, and is only there to collect the generous paycheck.

Ann Barrett is subjected to erotic visions late at night, which seem linked to her lackluster sex life. She goes downstairs and, in an apparent trance, disrobes and demands sex from Fischer. He strikes her, snapping her out of the trance, and she returns to herself, horrified and ashamed. A second incident occurs a day or so later; this time, she is awake but uninhibited due to alcohol. Her husband arrives a moment later to witness her advances to Fischer. He is resentful, and spurns Fischer's psychic ability, claiming that "Mr. Deutsch is wasting one-third of his money!" Stricken by the accusation, Fischer drops his psychic shields but is immediately attacked.