🎅🎆📘🎥Friday's Film Adaptation-Xmas in July🎥📘🎆🎅: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Summary:

First published on 19 December 1843, A Christmas Carol became an instant classic. Scrooge's transformation from grumpy miser to charitable figure carries a heart-warming message for the Christmas season - a time of peace and goodwill to all men.

Cruel miser Ebeneezer Scrooge has never met a shilling he doesn’t like...and hardly a man he does. And he hates Christmas most of all. When Scrooge is visited by his old partner, Jacob Marley, and the ghosts of Christmas Past, Christmas Present, and Christmas Yet to Come, he learns eternal lessons of charity, kindness, and goodwill. Experience a true Victorian Christmas!

With original illustrations by John Leech and an introduction by G. K. Chesterton, this deluxe edition makes a wonderful gift or collectible for adults and children alike.

Original Blog Review December 2014:

Not all of Charles Dickens' work is among my reading list but A Christmas Carol is my favorite of all.  It's the best Christmas tale, in my opinion.  At the heart of the story is what so many of us tend to forget, although perhaps not to the extent as Ebenezer Scrooge has, and that is that heart and kindness is more important than wealth.

“And therefore, Uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that [Christmas] has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!” 

“But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,' faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.
Business!' cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”  

“It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour.”  

“For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child Himself.”  

“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach!”

And I think the final quote from the book says more about why I love the book so much than any words I could come up with.

“And it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!” 

 

Re-Read Review 2017:

There was a time when I read A Christmas Carol annually but since starting my book blog it seems I that life just hasn't allowed me the time to read it yearly.  So I decided that I would make time this year to give it a read and its just as good as its always been.  I wish I could say we don't need to be reminded of what should be important to us at Christmastime but everyone is always so busy that the Christmas spirit doesn't stay with us the way it should.  Charles Dickens has a way of making us remember and I love him for it.  Merry Christmas everyone and if you aren't one to celebrate, try to remember that the true meaning of the story and the lessons Ebenezer Scrooge learns still rings true for you too and for every day: kindness and goodwill to your fellow man should never be far from your heart.

Re-Read Review 2019:

This book just never gets old.  Frankly, if there ever was a time we need to be reminded of what is truly important in life it's now.  With all the strife and ignorance and intolerance in the world, it's never wrong to be reminded of what Christmas is all about.  A Christmas Carol should be read throughout the year, not just during the holiday season.  The lessons of kindness, decency, and acceptance to our fellow man should be lived every day.  I don't mean to sound preachy or judgmental but Charles Dickens has a way of making the spirit of Christmas come alive in A Christmas Carol that often gets forgotten the other 364 days of the year.  Truth be told, not only does it remind us of the holiday spirit it's a pretty darn great ghost story too😉😉.

Re-Read Review 2020:

The only thing I want to add to my previous reviews is that 2020 needs A Christmas Carol more than ever.  We need to see the kindness all around more this year as there has been so much negativity, hatred, anger, and plain old fashioned heartbreak.  No matter what form you read, listen, watch, take the lessons the Ghosts of Christmas teach Ebenezer Scrooge to heart.  Charles Dickens may have had no idea what he was giving to the world or the impact it would have on humanity but for me the story never gets old and frankly I don't have to wait till Christmastime to enjoy it.  A true classic delightful gem.

RATING: 

Stave One
Marley's Ghost

Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and Scrooge's name was good upon' Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were partners for I don't know how many years. Scrooge was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, his sole mourner.

Scrooge never painted out Old Marley's name however. There it yet stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as Scrooge and Marley Sometimes people new to the business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley He answered to both names. It was all the same to him.

Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, was Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner!

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear Scrooge, how are you? when will you come to see me?" No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his fife inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blindmen's dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, "no eye at all is better than an evil eye, darkmaster!"

But what did Scrooge care!

Once upon a time — of all the good days in the year, upon a Christmas Eve-old Scrooge sat busy in his counting-house. It was cold, bleak, bitMg foggy weather and the city clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already.

The door of Scrooge's countinghouse was open that he might keel) his eye upon his clerk, who in a dismal litde cell beyond — a sort of tank-was copying letters. Scrooge had a very small fire., but the clerk's fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn't replenish it, for Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore the clerk put on his white comforter, and tried to warm himself at the candle; in which effort, not being a man of a strong imagination, he failed.

"A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!" cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge's nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation Scrooge had of his approach.

"Bah!" said Scrooge, "Humbug!"'

"Christmas a humbug, uncle! You don't mean that, I am sure."

"I do. Out upon merry Christmas. What's Christmas time to you buta time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a yearolder, and not an hour ri cher; a time for balanci ing your books and having every item in 'em through a round dozen of months presented deadagainst you? If I had my will, every idiot who goes about with 'MerryChristmas,' on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, andburied with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!"

"Uncle!"

"Nephew! Keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it mine."

"Keep it! But you don't keep it."

"Let me leave it alone, then. Much good may it do you! Much good it has ever done you!"

"There are many things from which I might have derived good, bywhich I have not profited, I dare say, Christmas among the rest. But I amsure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round-apart from the veneration due to its sacred origin, if anything belong' ingto it can be apart from that — as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitab1e, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of theyear, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-uphearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really werefellow-travellcrs to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound onother Journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!"

The clerk in the tank involuntarily applauded.

"Let me hear another sound from you," said Scrooge, "and you'll keep your Christmas by losing your situation. You're quite a powerful speaker, sir," he added, turning to his nephew. "I wonder you don't go into Parliament."

"Don't be angry, uncle. Come! Dine with us tomorrow."

Scrooge said that he would see him — yes, indeed he did. He went the whole length of the expression, and said that he would see him 'in that extremity first.

"But why?" cried Scrooge's nephew. "Why

"Why did you get married?"

"Because I fell in love."

"Because you fell in love!" growled Scrooge, as if that were the only one thing in the world more ridiculous than a merry Christmas. "Good afternoon!"

"Nay, uncle, but you never came to see me before that happened. Why give it as a reason for not coming now?"

"Good afternoon."

"I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; why cannot we be friends?"

"Good afternoon."

"I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas, and I'll keep my Christmas humour to the last. So A Merry Christmas, uncle!"

A contemporary comedy based on Charles Dickens' novel "A Christmas Carol," focusing on a television executive who decides to exploit the holidays in order to boost ratings.

Release Date: November 23, 1988
Running Time: 101 minutes

Director: Richard Donner

Cast:
Bill Murray as Francis Xavier "Frank" Cross
Karen Allen as Claire Phillips
John Forsythe as Lew Hayward
John Glover as Brice Cummings
Bobcat Goldthwait as Eliot Loudermilk
David Johansen as the Ghost of Christmas Past
Carol Kane as the Ghost of Christmas Present
Robert Mitchum as Preston Rhinelander
Nicholas Phillips as Calvin Cooley
Michael J. Pollard as Herman
Alfre Woodard as Grace Cooley
Mabel King as Gramma
John Murray as James Cross
Wendie Malick as Wendie Cross
Brian Doyle-Murray as Mr. Cross

Mary Ellen Trainor as Ted

Lisa Mende as Doris Cross

Maria Riva as Mrs. Rhinelander

Kate McGregor-Stewart as Lady Censor

Kathy Kinney as IBC Nurse

Robert Hammond as the Ghost of Christmas Future (uncredited)

 
Cameos
Jamie Farr as Himself / Jacob Marley
Buddy Hackett as Himself / Ebenezer Scrooge
Robert Goulet as Himself
John Houseman as Himself
Lee Majors as Himself
Mary Lou Retton as Herself / Tiny Tim
Maria Riva as Mrs. Rhinelander
Miles Davis, Larry Carlton, David Sanborn, and Paul Shaffer as street musicians

1935  /  1938  /  1951

1970  /  1983  /  1988

1992  /  1997  /  1999

Charles Dickens

One of the grand masters of Victorian literature, Charles Dickens was born on February 7, 1812, in Landport, Portsea, England. He died in Kent on June 9, 1870. The second of eight children of a family continually plagued by debt, the young Dickens came to know not only hunger and privation,but also the horror of the infamous debtors' prison and the evils of child labor. A turn of fortune in the shape of a legacy brought release from the nightmare of prison and "slave" factories and afforded Dickens the opportunity of two years' formal schooling at Wellington House Academy. He worked as an attorney's clerk and newspaper reporter until his Sketches by Boz (1836) and The Pickwick Papers (1837) brought him the amazing and instant success that was to be his for the remainder of his life. In later years, the pressure of serial writing, editorial duties, lectures, and social commitments led to his separation from Catherine Hogarth after twenty-three years of marriage. It also hastened his death at the age of fifty-eight, when he was characteristically engaged in a multitude of work.

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🍾🎉📘🎥Friday's Film Adaptation🎥📘🎉🍾: The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett

Summary:

Dashiell Hammett's classic The Thin Man introduced the world to Nick and Nora Charles, further made famous by the popular Thin Man films. With a new introduction by Denise Mina.

Nick Charles seems to find trouble wherever he goes. He thinks his sleuthing days are behind him when Julia Wolf, a former acquaintance, turns up dead. Nick—thanks to some persuasion from his enchanting wife, Nora—finds himself falling back into old habits and making a few polite inquiries. The prime suspect, Julia’s lover and boss Clyde Miller Wynant, has vanished without a trace. Everyone is after him, but Nick is not so sure Wynant is the culprit. And when another dubious figure bursts into their bedroom, waving a loaded handgun, it seems Nick and Nora’s adventure is only just beginning. 

Nick and Nora Charles are among Dashiell Hammett’s most alluring creations: a rich, glamourous couple who solve homicides in between wisecracks and martinis. At once knowing and unabashedly romantic, The Thin Man is a murder mystery that doubles as a sophisticated comedy of manners.

Original Review December 2017:
It's been over 20 years since I read this book but it was definitely an enjoyable read.  Nick and Nora are the epitome of romantic comedic detectives.  The pair has the kind of relationship we all hope to find.

RATING:

Chapter One
1 
I was leaning against the bar in a speakeasy on Fifty-second Street, waiting for Nora to finish her Christmas shopping, when a girl got up from the table where she had been sitting with three other people and came over to me. She was small and blonde, and whether you looked at her face or at her body in powder-blue sports clothes, the result was satisfactory. "Aren't you Nick Charles?" she asked.

I said: "Yes."

She held out her hand. "I'm Dorothy Wynant. You don't remember me, but you ought to remember my father, Clyde Wynant. You-"

"Sure," I said, "and I remember you now, but you were only a kid of eleven or twelve then, weren't you?"

"Yes, that was eight years ago. Listen: remember those stories you told me? Were they true?"

"Probably not. How is your father?"

She laughed. "I was going to ask you. Mamma divorced him, you know, and we never hear from him-except when he gets in the newspapers now and then with some of his carryings on. Don't you ever see him?"

My glass was empty. I asked her what she would have to drink, she said Scotch and soda. I ordered two of them and said: "No, I've been living in San Francisco."

She said slowly: "I'd like to see him. Mamma would raise hell if she found it out, but I'd like to see him."

"Well?"

"He's not where we used to live, on Riverside Drive, and he's not in the phone book or city directory."

"Try his lawyer," I suggested.

Her face brightened. "Who is he?"

"It used to be a fellow named Mac-something-or-other-Macaulay, that's it, Herbert Macaulay. He was in the Singer Building."

"Lend me a nickel," she said, and went out to the telephone. She came back smiling. "I found him. He's just round the corner on Fifth Avenue."

"Your father?"

"The lawyer. He says my father's out of town. I'm going round to see him." She raised her glass to me. "Family reunions. Look, why don't-"

Asta jumped up and punched me in the belly with her front feet. Nora, at the end of the leash, said: "She's had a swell afternoon-knocked over a table of toys at Lord & Taylor's, scared a fat woman silly by licking her leg in Saks's, and's been patted by three policemen."

I made introductions. "My wife, Dorothy Wynant. Her father was once a client of mine, when she was only so high. A good guy, but screwy."

"I was fascinated by him," Dorothy said, meaning me, "a real live detective, and used to follow him around making him tell me about his experiences. He told me awful lies, but I believed every word."

I said: "You look tired, Nora."

"I am. Let's sit down."

Dorothy Wynant said she had to go back to her table. She shook hands with Nora; we must drop in for cocktails, they were living at Courtland, her mother's name was Jorgensen now. We would be glad to and she must come see us some time, we were at the Normandie and would be in New York for another week or two. Dorothy patted the dog's head and left us.

We found a table. Nora said: "She's pretty."

"If you like them like that."

She grinned at me. "You got types?"

"Only you, darling-lanky brunettes with wicked jaws."

"And how about the red-head you wandered off with at the Quinns' last night?"

"That's silly," I said. "She just wanted to show me some French etchings."

Private detective Nick Charles and his wealthy wife Nora are back home at last and hoping for a quiet New Year when there is a murder. The obvious suspect is his wife, Nora's cousin, Selma.

Release Date: December 25, 1936

Release Time: 112 minutes

Director: W. S. Van Dyke

Cast:

William Powell as Nick Charles

Myrna Loy as Nora Charles

James Stewart as David Graham

Elissa Landi as Selma Landis

Joseph Calleia as "Dancer"

Jessie Ralph as Aunt Katherine Forrest

Alan Marshal as Robert Landis (credited as Alan Marshall)

Teddy Hart as Casper

Sam Levene as Lieutenant Abrams

Penny Singleton as Polly Byrnes (credited as Dorothy McNulty)

William Law as Lum Kee

George Zucco as Dr. Kammer

Paul Fix as Phil Byrnes

Skippy as Asta

Awards:

9th Academy Awards - March 4, 1937

Best Adapted Screenplay - Frances Goodrick & Albert Hackett - Nominated

Notes:

The film's storyline was written by Dashiell Hammett based on his characters Nick and Nora, but not on a particular novel or short story so even though it was original story, the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay nominated After the Thin Man for this category as all sequels were also considered adaptations, being based on the story and characters of the original film. 

The Thin Man   /  After the Thin Man

Dashiell Hammett
Also wrote as Peter Collinson, Daghull Hammett, Samuel Dashiell, Mary Jane Hammett

Samuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hardboiled detective novels and short stories. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), and the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse). In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on film, Hammett "is now widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time" and was called, in his obituary in the New York Times, "the dean of the... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction."

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🎃📘🎥Friday's Film Adaptation🎥📘🎃: Benighted by JB Priestley

Summary:

'Priestley is one of the finest and most popular storytellers of the last hundred years.' - Dame Margaret Drabble

'Abundant life flows through J.B. Priestley's books. He was the last of his kind.' - Stan Barstow

'J.B. Priestley is one of our literary icons of the 20th century. And it is time that we all became re-acquainted with his genius.' - Dame Judi Dench

Philip and Margaret Waverton and their friend Roger Penderel are driving through the mountains of Wales when a torrential downpour washes away the road and forces them to seek shelter for the night. They take refuge in an ancient, crumbling mansion inhabited by the strange and sinister Femm family and their brutish servant Morgan. Determined to make the best of the circumstances, the benighted travellers drink, talk, and play games to pass the time while the storm rages outside. But as the night progresses and tensions rise, dangerous and unexpected secrets emerge. On the house's top floor are two locked doors; behind one of them lies the mysterious, unseen Sir Roderick Femm, and behind the other lurks an unspeakable terror. Which is more deadly: the apocalyptic storm outside the house or the unknown horrors that await within? And will any of them survive the night?

Benighted (1927), a classic 'old dark house' novel of psychological terror, was the second novel by J. B. Priestley (1894-1984), better known for his classics The Good Companions (1929), Angel Pavement (1930) and Bright Day (1946). The basis for James Whale's 1932 film The Old Dark House, Benighted returns to print for the first time in fifty years. This edition includes the unabridged text of the first British edition, a new introduction by Orrin Grey, and a reproduction of the rare jacket art of the 1927 Heinemann edition.

CHAPTER I 

Margaret was saying something, but he couldn’t hear a word. The downpour and the noise of the engine were almost deafening. Suddenly he stopped the car and leaned back, relieved, relaxed, free for a moment from the task of steering a way through the roaring darkness. He had always felt insecure driving at night, staring out at a little lighted patch of road and groping for levers and switches, pressing pedals, had always been rather surprised when the right thing happened. But to-night, on these twisting mountain roads, some of them already awash, with storm after storm bursting upon them and the whole night now one black torrent, every mile was a miracle. It couldn’t last. Their rattling little box of mechanical tricks was nothing but a piece of impudence. He turned to Margaret.

 ‘You needn’t have done that,’ she was saying now. She had had to raise her voice, of course, but it was as cool and clear as ever. She was still detached, but apparently, for once, not amused. 

‘Done what?’ Philip returned, but his heart sank, for he knew what she meant. Then he felt annoyed. Couldn’t he stop the damned thing for a minute? He was easily the coldest and wettest of the three of them.

‘You needn’t have stopped the car,’ Margaret replied. ‘I was only saying that we ought to have turned back before. It’s simply idiotic going on like this. Where are we?’ 

He felt an icy trickle going down his back and shook himself. ‘Hanged if I know,’ he told her. ‘Somewhere in wildest Wales. That’s as near as I can get. I’ve never found my bearings since we missed that turning. But I think the direction’s vaguely right.’ He wriggled a little. He was even wetter than he had imagined. He had got wet when he had gone out to change the wheel and then later when she had stopped and he had had to look at the engine, and since then the rain had been coming in steadily. Not all the hoods and screens in the world could keep out this appalling downpour. 

‘This is hopeless.’ Margaret was calmly condemning the situation. ‘What time is it?’ 

There was no light on the dashboard, so he struck a match and held it near the clock. Half-past nine. There was just time to catch a glimpse of Margaret’s profile before the tiny flame vanished. It was like overhearing a faintly scornful phrase about himself. He suddenly felt responsible for the whole situation, not only for the delay on the road and the missed turning, but for the savage hills and the black spouting night. Once again he saw himself fussing away, nervous, incompetent, slightly disordered, while she looked on, critical, detached, indulgent or contemptuous. When anything went wrong—and it was in the nature of things to go wrong—she always made him feel like that. Perhaps all wives did. It wasn’t fair. It was taking a mean advantage of the fact that you cared what they thought, for once you stopped caring the trick must fail. 

‘We’d better go on and try and arrive somewhere,’ Margaret was saying. ‘Shall I drive now?’ He was expecting that. She always imagined that she was the better driver. And perhaps she was, though. Not really so skilful with the wheel, the gears, the brakes, but far cooler than he was simply because she never saw the risks. Her imagination didn’t take sudden leaps, didn’t see a shattered spine a finger’s breadth away, didn’t realise that we all went capering along a razor-edge. Unlike him, she blandly trusted everything, everything, that is, except human beings. Now they were not so bad, merely stupid—the thought came flashing as he shifted his position—it was only the outside things that were so devilish. 

‘No, thanks. I’ll keep on. There’s no point in changing now. We’ll arrive somewhere soon.’ He was about to reach out to the switch when the light of a match at the back turned him round. Penderel, who had been dozing there for the last two hours, was now lighting a cigarette. ‘Hello!’ he shouted back. ‘You all right, Penderel? Not drowned yet?’ Penderel’s face, queerly illuminated, looked at once drawn and impish. A queer stick!—mad as a hatter some people thought, Margaret among them; but Philip wasn’t sure. He suddenly felt glad to see him there. 

Penderel wouldn’t mind all this. Penderel blew out smoke, held up the lighted match, and leaned forward, as vivid as a newly painted portrait. He grinned. ‘Where are we?’ Then the match went out and he was nothing but a shadow.

‘We don’t know,’ Philip shouted back above the drumming rain. ‘We’ve missed the way. We’re somewhere in the Welsh mountains and it’s half-past nine. Sorry.’ 

‘Don’t mention it.’ Penderel seemed to be amused. ‘I say, this storm’s going on for ever. I believe it’s the end of the world. They’ve overheard the talk at the Ainsleys and have decided to blot us all out. What do you think?’ 

Philip felt Margaret stirring beside him. He knew that her body was stiffening with disapproval, partly because the Ainsleys, with whom they had all three been staying, were old friends of hers, but chiefly because she didn’t like Penderel, whose existence she had almost forgotten, and was only too ready to disapprove of everything he said or did. ‘We shan’t see even Shrewsbury to-night,’ Philip shouted back. A halt at Shrewsbury had been their modified plan, following upon their delay on the road and their slow progress in the torrential rain. 

‘Shrewsbury!’ Penderel laughed. ‘Nor the Hesperides either. We’ll be lucky if we get anywhere, out of this. I’ll tell you what’—he hesitated a moment—‘I don’t want to frighten Mrs. Waverton——’ 

‘Go on, Mr. Penderel.’ Margaret was icy. ‘I’m not easily frightened.’ 

‘Aren’t you? I am,’ Penderel replied, loudly and cheerfully. He seemed to be for ever putting his foot in it, either didn’t know or didn’t care. ‘I was thinking that you’ll have to be careful here. We’ve had a week’s heavy rain, and thunderstorms for the last two days, and in this part of the world they’re always having landslides and whatnot. Don’t be surprised to find yourself driving into the middle of a lake, or the whole hillside coming down on you, or the road disappearing under the front wheels.’ 

The noise and the darkness made snubbing difficult, but Margaret did what she could. ‘I must say I should be very surprised indeed,’ she threw back. ‘Hurry on, Philip. Open the windscreen. We can’t be any wetter than we are now and I want to look out for any turnings or signposts.’ 

‘Not that I care, you know,’ Penderel called out. ‘I don’t want to go to Shrewsbury. I don’t particularly want to go anywhere. Something might happen here, and nothing ever happens in Shrewsbury, and nothing much on the other side of Shrewsbury. But here there’s always a chance.’ 

As Philip started the car again he wished himself a hundred miles the other side of Shrewsbury, moving sedately down some sensible main road towards a fire and clean sheets. The road they were on now seemed little better than a track, twisting its way along the hillside. There were no lights to be seen, nothing but the flashing rain and the jumping scrap of lighted road ahead, full of deep ruts and stones and shining with water. He moved cautiously forward, shaking the raindrops from his eyes and gripping the wheel as hard as he could. This ring of metal seemed his only hold upon security now that everything was black and sliding and treacherous, and even then it rattled uselessly in his hand at times. One silly twist and they were bogged for the night or even over the edge. Earlier it had been rather exhilarating rushing through this savagery of earth and weather, but now he felt tired and apprehensive. Penderel had been exaggerating, of course, perhaps trying to frighten Margaret. But no, he wouldn’t be doing that, though he probably knew that she didn’t like him and was against his returning from the Ainsleys’ with them. He exaggerated for his own good pleasure, being a wild youth who liked to see life as either a screaming buffoonery or a grand catastrophe, something Elizabethan in five acts. Yet there were landslides after heavy rain in this part of the world. There might be floods too. Philip saw them stuck somewhere on this hillside all night. And what a night too! He shivered and involuntarily pressed the accelerator. 

The car roared forward, and though he immediately released the pressure it did not slacken speed because there was a sudden dip in the road. Just in front the hillside jutted into a sharp edge of rock and the road turned a blind corner. Philip had only time to touch the footbrake when this corner swung towards him. He gave the wheel a hard twist; for a second the car went sliding; and the next moment they were round the corner but apparently plunging into a river. The road had disappeared; there was nothing ahead but the gleam of water. In they went with a roar and a splash. Philip gripped the wheel harder than ever; he felt Margaret’s hand upon his left arm; he heard a shout from Penderel behind. Then the roaring and splashing filled the night, but the car seemed to be slowing down. He accelerated and the engine responded with loud spasmodic bursts, but all to no purpose. The car swung forward, stopped, drummed, and then shook violently, swung forward again, then stopped. 

‘Don’t stop.’ Margaret was crying in his ear.

‘Can’t help it,’ he shouted. What a damn silly remark! Did she think they were in a motor-boat! He must do something though. The engine was still running, trembling there under his feet, like a hunted beast. Hastily he shoved the lever into low gear and rammed down the accelerator. The car gave an agonised roar and seemed to shake itself like a dog, but for a moment or so nothing else happened. ‘Here for the night, here for the night,’ Philip heard himself chanting idiotically. Then slowly, almost painfully it seemed, the car moved forward, protesting every yard against the unfamiliar element. And now the road began to climb again; the worst was passed; the lights showed solid ground ahead, and a few minutes’ more splashing brought them out into earth and air. The little box of tricks had won. At least, Philip reminded himself, it had won so far; end of first round. But what was coming next? They were still climbing a little, and now the hillside to the right seemed less steep and rocky, but that to the left fell away more sharply. He could see nothing there but rain falling into a black gulf. It had the curiously vivid and dramatic quality of rain in a film. 

Margaret was saying something and appeared to be fumbling in the pocket in the door. What was it she wanted? He caught the word ‘stop’ in her reply, and so once again brought the car to a standstill. ‘What is it?’ he asked. 

‘I’m looking for the map,’ she replied. ‘We must find out where we are. We can’t go on like this.’ 

‘A good voyage, Waverton!’ Penderel shouted. ‘Have a cigarette?’ Philip found the open case under his nose when he turned, and lit up with Penderel.  Then there was a little click and the whole car was illuminated, transformed into a queer tiny room. The night was banished, wind and rain and darkness disappearing behind the shining screen; Margaret had found the little observation lamp and had fixed it in the plug. She had also found the map and was now bending over it, the lamp in her hand. But it was only a flimsy affair of paper and the rain had played havoc with it. Philip, who was visited by a sudden feeling of cosiness, watched her turn it over and stare at it with wide grave eyes. Then he saw her shake her head; just like a child, he thought. He wanted to tell her so and give her a quick little hug, a sign across a thousand miles of desert; then rush away to the nearest shelter and talk everything out with her. What was she feeling? How odd it was that he didn’t know! 

‘You look,’ she said, holding out the map. ‘I can’t see anything. It’s all a stupid puddle.’ 

He peered at the thing just to satisfy her. Roads and rivers and stout acres were now so many blotches. ‘It seems to me it represents this country very well, for everything here’s under water. The thing’s useless. Besides I can’t make out where we missed the turning.’ He followed a possible road with his forefinger, only to discover that it led him into a long blue smudge, under which some fifty square miles were submerged. Perhaps if they went there, everything would be different. Perhaps they were there. ‘I give it up,’ he told her. Then he turned to see Penderel’s tousled hair and bright eyes above the back of the seat. ‘Would you like to look at the map, Penderel? We can’t make anything of it.’

Penderel grinned and shook his head. ‘No map for me. I don’t believe we’re on a map. Drive on and we’ll arrive somewhere. Only don’t let it be water. We be land rats.’ 

Margaret made a slight gesture of impatience. ‘It’s absurd now trying to get to any particular place. We must stop at the first village we come to and ask for shelter. What’s that?’ There came a crack of thunder that rolled and clanged among the hills. Philip opened the door on his side, threw away his cigarette, looked out at the thick jigging wires of rain, and then hastily closed the door. ‘More rain and thunder,’ he said, then looked doubtfully at Margaret. ‘We’d better move on and, as you say, get in anywhere.’ There arrived with Margaret’s nod a savage assent from the sky, another roll and clanging of iron doors on the summits above. 

Philip started the engine again. Margaret put out the little observation lamp and with it any fleeting sense of cosiness. The night invaded them once more; they were wet and numbed and maundering on towards a furious autumnal midnight, among cracking mountains, lost in a world of black water; they were sitting crazily behind two lamps that showed nothing but a streaming track, the flashing of the rain, and the gulf beyond. When they moved off, very cautiously hugging the right-hand side, he could hear Penderel’s voice raised above the din. He was singing or at least shouting some kind of song, like a man in his bath. The whole night was going to be one vast bath and so Penderel was singing. A queer youth!—Philip looked down on him from a great height, but then suddenly remembered that Penderel was only two years younger than himself. It was his daft drinking and shouting and singing that magnified these two years. Unlike him, Penderel didn’t seem to have escaped from the War yet, and every night with him was still the night before one moved up to the line. Why didn’t Margaret like him? He wanted to think about Margaret, but just now there wasn’t time. 

There was another sharp bend in the road, not fifty yards away, and he decided to nose round it very cautiously. What a tremendous rumbling there was! Was it thunder? He shouted to the others. Margaret was leaning forward, peering out. ‘Look out, Waverton,’ he thought he heard Penderel shout. The bend was here, another corner as sharp as the last, and he pulled round and ran straight into roaring chaos. A torrent of water was pouring down upon the road and something struck the car, a large clod of earth or a rock, with a resounding jolt. The entire slope above seemed to be rumbling and shuttering. In another minute they would be buried or sent flying over the other side of the road. Dazed as he was, he realised that there was just a chance of escape, and he pressed down the accelerator while he kept the other foot trembling on the brake for fear the road in front should be blocked or should have fallen away. So far it seemed to be clear, though the whole hillside immediately behind them now seemed to be crashing down. The road ran back in a curve, probably between two spurs of the hill. Margaret was shrieking in his ear: ‘Lights! Look, Phil. Lights! Pull in there.’ He saw them not far in front, where the road seemed to bend back again, beyond the centre of its horseshoe curve. Without thinking, he began to slow down. There seemed to be some sort of gateway there, an entrance to a drive perhaps. Then the rumbling and crashing and tearing behind, growing in volume every moment, awakened him to the danger of the situation. 

It was obvious now that there was a house in front, and he could see the open entrance to the drive. But what kind of place was this to stay in, with the whole hillside threatening to descend upon them and tons of water coming down from somewhere? ‘We’d better go on while we can,’ he shouted to Margaret. ‘It’s not safe here.’ But at the same time he clapped on the brakes and brought the car down to a walking pace. They were now only a few yards from the gateway, were actually sheltered by the high wall of the garden. He felt a vague sense of safety, the sight of that wall keeping at bay the terror of the water and the crumbling slope. 

He caught Margaret’s ‘No, stop!’ and instantly obeyed the cry. He did it against his judgment, yet felt partly relieved to be free for a moment from wheels and brakes. She clutched his arm and he could feel her trembling a little. ‘Let’s stay here,’ she was gasping. 

‘We ought to go on while the road’s still open.’ His voice was hoarse and he too was shaking. 

‘Let’s get out and see what’s happening,’ Penderel chimed in. ‘I believe the whole damned hill’s going. Something’s burst up above.’ He was opening the door. Horribly cramped, Philip tumbled out and joined him in the black downpour. At least it was good to be on one’s legs again, and though the night was hideous, the situation seemed less precarious than it did when one was sitting in there, playing fantastic tricks with mechanism. 

‘Are we going to push on,’ Penderel shouted, ‘or stay here and ask these people for shelter? We can’t go back, for that road’s completely done in. And the road in front may be done in too. I’m for staying here.’ 

‘But listen to that.’ The fury behind had not spent itself and even appeared to be gathering force. ‘We’re close to it,’ Philip went on, ‘and the whole place seems dangerous to me. It may be all washed away before morning. And really we ought to tell those people what’s happening.’ 

Penderel walked forward, peered through the entrance, and then returned. ‘They don’t seem to be bothering much about it. Lights on, but no signs of alarm.’ 

‘Perhaps they don’t know.’ Philip shivered. ‘For that matter there may not be anybody there. They may have cleared off.’ 

Margaret was looking out of the car. ‘Why are you standing there?’ For once she sounded forlorn. ‘I can’t stand much more of this. It’s a nightmare.’ 

‘Penderel thinks we ought to stay here,’ Philip told her. ‘But I feel inclined to go on. It isn’t safe here and the road in front seems to be still open.’ He looked forward as far as he could, and though the road was partly flooded it revealed no dangerous obstacle.

‘But is it open?’ Penderel asked the question, and Margaret, still peering out, seemed to echo him. 

The next moment they were answered. There came a rumble and a following roar, this time in front of them, somewhere not far away in the darkness. It seemed as if a whole side of the hill was slipping or being washed away. The noise was deafening, terrifying, like a great buffeting of the ears; and even the ground beneath their feet seemed to tremble. The road in front had gone, and what was left of the horseshoe bend, the little stretch on which they stood, was now being rapidly flooded. ‘Bring her in here,’ Penderel shouted, and rushed to the drive, bent on leading the way. Philip hesitated long enough to feel the sudden chill wash of water round his legs, and then clambered back into the car. The rain was streaming down his face and he could hardly see; his hands were so numbed that they were like pieces of wood; but the engine was running and he contrived to jam in the gear and slip the clutch with only the loss of a few seconds. For a moment or two the car roared helplessly, but then it began to move slowly, with a prodigious splashing, and he turned it through the entrance and up the drive, which ran forward at a slight incline. He could see Penderel hurrying in front, a jerky and blurred figure in the rain, just like a man in a film. Now the house, surprisingly large to be in such an out-of-the-way place, towered above them. What was to be done with the car? Philip couldn’t decide, so merely turned it round the corner, where the drive curved towards the front door only a few yards away, and then came to a standstill. The head lamps shone upon the house and the door was strongly, dramatically, illuminated by their uncouth glare. It was a large door, stout enough for a little fortress, and three broad steps led up to it. Somehow it looked as if it were closed for ever. 

Philip found Penderel looking in at him. ‘Benighted!—that’s the word,’ Penderel said. ‘I’ve been trying to remember it all the way from the gate. I’ll go and beg for shelter. What a night! What a place! I like this, though, don’t you?’ 

Philip stared after him as he walked forward to the door. The night was still a tumult, full of a distant rumbling and crashing and the ceaseless drumming of the rain, yet there seemed to fall in it now a sudden quietness. It was the house itself that was so quiet. Driving up like this, you expected a bustle, shadows hurrying across the blinds, curtains lifted, doors flung open. But so far this house hadn’t given the slightest sign, in spite of its lighted windows. It seemed strangely turned in upon itself, showing nothing but a blank face in the night. You could hardly imagine that great front door ever being opened at all. 

And now Penderel was there at the door, darkening it with his shadow and groping for a knocker. Philip turned to Margaret, who was leaning back, exhausted perhaps. Once inside, out of the night, warmed and dry, eyes meeting eyes again in the light, they could perhaps talk everything out: now was their chance, before they reached home again and custom fell on them like weights of armour. He put out a reassuring hand, and though she didn’t meet it with her own, he seemed to catch a faint smile. Did she whisper something? He couldn’t tell. All he heard now was Penderel knocking at that door.

An eccentric millionaire invites a car salesman to visit his decaying family home.

Release Date: October 30, 1963

Release Time: 86 minutes

Director: William Castle

Cast:

Tom Poston as Tom Penderel

Robert Morley as Roderick Femm

Janette Scott as Cecily Femm

Joyce Grenfell as Agatha Femm

Mervyn Johns as Potiphar Femm

Fenella Fielding as Morgana Femm

Peter Bull as Caspar/Jasper Femm

Danny Green as Morgan Femm

John Harvey as Club Receptionist

Amy Dalby as Gambler (uncredited)

1932  /  1963

JB Priestly

John Boynton Priestley was born in 1894 in Yorkshire, the son of a schoolmaster. After leaving Belle Vue School when he was 16, he worked in a wool office but was already by this time determined to become a writer. He volunteered for the army in 1914 during the First World War and served five years; on his return home, he attended university and wrote articles for the Yorkshire Observer. After graduating, he established himself in London, writing essays, reviews, and other nonfiction, and publishing several miscellaneous volumes. In 1927 his first two novels appeared, Adam in Moonshine and Benighted. In 1929 Priestley scored his first major critical success as a novelist, winning the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for The Good Companions. Angel Pavement (1930) followed and was also extremely successful. Throughout the next several decades, Priestley published numerous novels, many of them very popular and successful, including Bright Day (1946), and Lost Empires (1965), and was also a prolific and highly regarded playwright.

Priestley died in 1984, and though his plays have continued to be published and performed since his death, much of his fiction has unfortunately fallen into obscurity. Recently, some of his most famous novels have been reprinted in England by Great Northern Books; Valancourt Books is republishing Benighted and Priestley’s excellent collection of weird short stories The Other Place (1953).

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