Product: 13 Ghosts (1960)
Rating: 5.0
Most fun old haunted house family horror film.
13 Ghosts is one of the most fun of the old black and white horror movies, and before Poltergeist, the only "family" horror movie, unless you count comedies like The Spirit Is Willing. Humor, fun gimmicks, and good acting by a great cast make it one of the most memorable haunted house films of the era.Donald Woods is a father, struggling to provide for his family and failing, who inherits an old dark house from his uncle Plato Zorba. Woods' low-key performance as a mild-mannered, trusting, accepting, and gullible version of Ward Clever provides some of the more amusing aspects of the film. He decides to move into the old mansion simply because he can't afford to pay the rent in their own house with his salary from a natural history museum. His son Buck, played by Charles Herbert (Houseboat) is an avid reader of ghost stories and thrilled at the chance to search the house for spirits. Rounding out the cast is Rosemary De Camp (On Moonlight Bay) as the mother, Margaret Hamilton (the wicked witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz) as the housekeeper / medium / witch(?), and Martin Milner (who had previously appeared opposite Elizabeth Taylor as a juvenile, and later went on to star in Adam 12) as the lawyer handling Zorba's estate.Besides the house, the estate included a box containing a pair of gadgety glasses. These are the main gimmick of the film - they allow the wearer to see ghosts. And there are twelve ghosts to see in that house, including the ghost of a fierce lion and Zorba himself, who, it turns out, was a world class ghost collector. But who will be the 13th? You'll have fun finding out. The DVD also includes a pair of ghost-viewing glasses to help you out.The remake is scarier but only by virtue of an R-rating at the cost of all the charm of the original.