Curse of the Demon (1957)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Curse of the Demon (1957) – J. Tourneur

One of my favourite films and one that I can watch annually (at Halloween) without it losing any of its fun.  Director Jacques Tourneur was a graduate of the Val Lewton School of Horror film-making, where low budgets necessitated a greater use of shadowy implication rather than explicit or graphic horror (see Cat People or I Walked with a Zombie).  Of course, fast forward to the late 1950s and producer interference forced Tourneur to actually show the Demon (which apparently he did not want to do) – but it makes no difference because the rest of the film is so successful in its spookiness.  The plot sees Dana Andrews (who was making his mark as an ambiguous “hero” in late Fritz Lang films at the same time) as a sceptical scientific psychologist attending a conference in England (cue Stonehenge) with the aim of debunking the leader of a “devil cult” (played magnificently by Niall MacGinnis). In the process, Andrews gets a curse placed on him, giving him just 3 days “time allowed” before the demon is to strike.  Andrews starts to slowly lose his grip, but is it the psychological pressure or an actual supernatural haunting that is bringing him to the edge?  Along the way, we see a séance, hypnotism to regress someone back to the “night of the demon” (the original British title of the film), a mysterious windstorm at a Halloween party for kids (complete with scary clown), and of course the demon itself.  To cap it all off, there is actual suspense, as we wonder whether Andrews can escape the curse, while the clock ticks down his time allowed.