White Christmas (1954)

Those are the words said by the narrator in the opening scene of Netflix’s horror TV series called, The Haunting of Hill House. We see an eerie old mansion with dark forbearing inner walls, floors, and some other details that indicate that this house is a mysterious character in this horror story. The opening narration, although, puzzled me and begged the question: what would sanity and reality have to do with a mysterious mansion?

When I first saw this opening scene of Mike Flanagan’s The Haunting of Hill House back in 2018; in all honesty, I thought it would be another cliché horror film with a haunted house. Would you blame me? Any mention of eerie old mansions brings at least a dozen of different images to mind of old New England homes, reminiscent of so many classic horror films. I’m happy to say, I was completely wrong.

Another cliché comes to mind: “don’t judge a book by its cover”, and funny enough, The Haunting of Hill House is based on a book by Shirley Jackson, by the same name, and is considered by some, the best literary ghost story to be ever written. Not only for its ability to divert from expectation, but to redefine the ghost genre altogether. Hill House uses those ghost stories in Jackson’s novel and flips the reality of mental issues on its head.

In this story, the focus is on the loveable and tragic Crane family, specifically, on the siblings: Steven, Shirley, Theo, and the twins, Luke and Nell. Each kid will melt your heart, and as adults, you sympathize with them even more for this reason. The audience hops on the emotional rollercoaster with the Crane family right from the get-go, as you feel the highs and lows on this horror ride, from two different time periods: modern day to the past of Hill House.

Their parents, Hugh and Olivia (Liv), move the siblings to Hill House, as a way to reap the financial benefits of “flipping” Hill House and spruce it up for profit. As one might expect from a horror story, all doesn’t go to plan. Their mother, Liv, dies at Hill House, but the siblings never find out what actually happened to her. When it comes down to it, this isn’t really a ghost story, but a story of how a family grapples with mental health issues and their methods to overcome their past trauma.