Night of the Demon

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For the 1980 film, see Night of the Demon (1980 film).
Night of the Demon
Directed by Jacques Tourneur
Produced by Hal E. Chester
Written by Story:
M.R. James
Screenplay:
Charles Bennett
Hal E. Chester
Starring Dana Andrews
Peggy Cummins
Niall MacGinnis
Athene Seyler
Music by Clifton Parker
Cinematography Edward Scaife
Editing by Michael Gordon
Distributed by Columbia
Release date(s) UK December 15, 1957
USA July, 1958
Running time 95 min.
Country UK
Language English
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

Night of the Demon is a 1957 British horror film adaptation of M. R. James' Casting the Runes (1911). Directed by filmmaker Jacques Tourneur, the film stars Dana Andrews as John Holden, Peggy Cummins as Joanna Harrington and Niall MacGinnis as Dr. Julian Karswell. The plot revolves around the American Professor John Holden investigating a Satanic cult active in England. With evidence suggesting the cult being responsible for more than one death in recent months with evidence pointing towards the group's leader, Dr. Julian Karswell. When Holden comes too close to Karswell for comfort, he slips a ancient parchment into Andrews' research folder. The document carries a curse that will mean death in three days for whoever possesses it.

Night of the Demon's production was turbulent by clashing ideas between producer Hal E. Chester against Jacques Tourneur and writer Charles Bennett. Against Bennett's and Tourneur's wishes of leaving the supernatural demon's existence up to the audience, Chester demanded to make the demon have a highly visible presence on-camera. The film was also edited further in America in its 1958 debut under the title of The Curse of the Demon as the second half of a double feature to accompany the film The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958).

Contents

[edit] Plot

Karswell (Niall MacGinnis, left) meets a sceptical Holden (Dana Andrews)
Karswell (Niall MacGinnis, left) meets a sceptical Holden (Dana Andrews)

Sceptical American psychologist John Holden flies to England to take part in a conference on the supernatural and lead an investigation into the activities of an obscure British devil-cult leader Julian Karswell. On arrival, he is stunned to learn British Professor Henry Harrington — instigator of the investigation — has died just prior to his arrival, apparently killed by an unknown animal. After the visiting the funeral home, where he meets Harrington's pretty, young schoolteacher-niece, Holden is contacted by Karswell by phone, who warns him off continuing the investigation with a loosely-veiled death threat. Holden dismisses Karswell as a crank, but gradually comes to realise that Karswell may have more than natural powers and a sinister disposition. In fact, Karswell has placed a curse on him using runic inscriptions on a piece of parchment, just as he did to Harrington, who in fact was killed by a demon in the film's opening scene. Holden finally realizes that he too will be killed by a demon unless he can first turn the curse back on the one who gave him the parchment—Karswell.

The curse can only be transferred by passing the parchment to the recipient without the recipient knowing it at that moment. After several failed attempts, Holden finally succeeds in passing the parchment to Karswell, who discovers it immediately afterwards. The wind then carries it out of his hand and onto a train track, where it burns spontaneously. The terrified Karswell can see the gigantic demon (invisible to everyone else) coming after him, and is powerless to stop it and unable to run away from it. Karswell meets a gruesome end, as the demon picks him up and claws him to death.

"Night of the Demon" - Discussion between Karswell and Holden

dialogue clip from the film.
Problems listening to the file? See media help.

[edit] Production

Screenwriter Charles Bennett owned the rights to the original story The Casting of the Runes and wrote a script based around it under the title The Haunted. Barnett sold the script to independent producer and former child actor Hal E. Chester shortly before going to America. Bennett regretted selling the as script on arrival to America, he was informed that RKO had approached him the purchase of his script with Barnett as his own director. Actors Robert Taylor and Dick Powell were in line for these leading role if this production were to take place.[1][2][3]

Director Jacques Tourneur was brought in to direct under recommendation to Chester from the producer Ted Richmond; the producer of Tourneur's previous film Nightfall (1957).[2]. Arguments occurred during filming between Chester and Tourneur. One event was during the filming of the wind scene, Tourneur tried to convince that he needed to upgrade his two electric fans to two airplane engines. When Chester hesitated, Tourneur's friend and leading actor Dana Andrews threatened to leave the picture if Chester wouldn't let "the director direct the picture."[2]

After completion of the principal shooting, Chester changed two factors of the film. The greatest change was to show the titular demon at the beginning and end of the film. Tourneur was against the addition of showing the demon, stating "The scenes where you see the demon were shot without me...the audience should never have been been completely certain of having seen the demon." Barnett, also angry at the script changes said "If [Chester] walked up my driveway right now, I'd shoot him dead."[3] Secondly, Chester cut thirteen minutes of the film for the American film release under the title of Curse of the Demon, but these scenes have been restored to all home video versions of the film.[2] Cut scenes included a visit to the Hobart family farm, a visit to Stonehenge, and snippets of the seance scenes and conversations between Karswell and his mother.[4]

[edit] Cast

[edit] DVD releases

Night of the Demon was released on a Region 1 DVD which also contains the shorter Curse of the Demon. A Region 2 "50th Anniversary Special" DVD was due to be released by DD Home Entertainment on September 17, 2007 but due to financial problems with the parent company this is now 'on hold' awaiting a new release date. A television adaptation of "Casting the Runes" was released in August by Network DVD.'.[5]

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Perry, 1984
  2. ^ a b c d Fujiwara 1998, p. 242-246
  3. ^ a b Jeff Stafford. "Curse of the Demon (1958) Articles" tcm.com. Retrieved: May 7, 2008.
  4. ^ Bansak 1995, p. 434-440
  5. ^ Mondo Esoterica

[edit] Bibliography

  • Perry, Danny. Cult Movies. Dell, 1984. ISBN 0440516315.
  • Fujiwara, Chris. Jacques Tourneur: The Cinema of Nightfall. McFarland, 1998. ISBN 0786404914.
  • Bansak, Edward G. Fearing the Dark: The Val Lewton Career. McFarland, 1995. ISBN 0786417099.

[edit] External links

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