The Red House (1947)

I wanted to but couldn't!

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Edward G. Robinson generally excelled in making interesting roles and particularly border line cases. This is one of the most extreme ones. Together with Judith Anderson, his sister in this film who pities him and has taken care of him all his life, they have brought up an adopted daughter and concealed her true origin from her. The film is bristling with mysteries and secrets from the start. How did he get his wooden leg? Why is he so terrified of his own forest? The question marks keep towering until the first blow is dealt and the first shot is fired, and then the weird but logical consequences of a natural development keep assembling into a constantly more eerie plot of hidden traumas that ultimately must burst out into the open. Robinson's acting is of particular interest here, and the director specializes all the way in catching the silent language of expressions, furtive glances, worried looks, especially in the young girl (Allene Roberts) who looks worried from the start and has reasons to be. There is a secondary plot as well with a loose woman finding herself in the wrong company of an unwilling villain, who is paid to add to the scariness, so the film is replenished indeed with intriguing drama, gradually towering into a very appropriate finale in a passionate burst of confusion.Well, well, the film is a perfect example of how a petty rustic story of farmers and small folk by the cinema can be turned into a towering drama of both tragedy and release. Miklos Rosza with his music completes the stamp of perfection, and a film like this could not have found more suitable music of more spellbinding kind.

I have obviously seen a different movie than many of the other user-reviewers. They have praised this as one of the best, great music, fantastic performances etc etc etc.I watched it knowing absolutely nothing about it and expecting nothing and that is what I got.The "wonderful" music was omnipresent, loud and intrusive. When you want to say "turn down the music" something is definitely wrong.The casting ? Robinson and Dame Judith as siblings ? Really? In which gene pool ? Typically the "high school" aged kids are too old, especially Julie London.Then there is the "plot". It just made no sense. It was not "mysterious" it was just vague, muddled, annoying and dumb.Seeing a young Rory Calhoun was one of the only pluses in this mess of a movie.

Dame Judith Anderson is relatively quiet in comparison to her other film and stage triumphs, but when she decides to burn down that haunted cottage, where a murder took place 15 years before, I thought she was coming back as Mrs. Danvers in "Rebecca," 7 years before. Remember what she did to Manderley?Anderson lives with her brother, portrayed by Edward G. Robinson, a questionable character and their adopted daughter. As the film goes on, we slowly find out what had happened years before.Everything begins to erupt when Robinson hires Lon McCalister, a neighborhood boy, to help him around the farm, and the latter, taking a short-cut through the woods to get home, stumbles upon the deep woods, hears voices and screaming throughout. He is soon joined by the adopted daughter who slowly begins to remember this red house.Eerie, but somewhat entertaining. Rory Calhoun stars as the drunken guy hired by Robinson to keep tabs on the surrounding area around the house.

Made in 1946 and released a year later, THE RED HOUSE is a United Artists release starring Edward G. Robinson as a man concealing an ugly secret with his spinster sister. The sister is played by Judith Anderson. Also in the cast are future stars Rory Calhoun and Julie London.The story, based on George Chamberlain's novel, takes many dramatic twists and turns. This is no small feat considering we already know early into the film that Robinson is covering up a crime, one he likely committed years ago. But in some ways, he is backgrounded until the last act; instead, the specter of danger casts its long shadow over two high school couples who are foregrounded-- one played by wholesome Lon McCallister and attractive Allene Roberts, and the other couple being Calhoun and London. The innocence of these young lovers is at risk due to the evil forces that surround them.It should be noted that at an overall running time of 100 minutes, the narrative is gradual and somewhat leisurely until the end. Yet this gives director Delmer Daves plenty of time to emphasize the bucolic countryside and its inhabitants, as well as establish the more sinister atmospheric touches that dot the rural landscape and threaten to overtake it. I won't spoil the final sequence for those who haven't seen it, but when Anderson's life is in jeopardy because she's gone into the woods where the titular dwelling and its secret exist, Robinson's character snaps. He truly goes berserk, setting up a spectacular death scene for the actor to play.Is this Edward G. Robinson's best movie performance? Possibly. For what it's worth, THE RED HOUSE is not only a showcase for him, but for all the performers who make the most of their roles. As for the film itself, it's a glimpse into a simpler post-war time. And it proves that even those simpler times had complicated people dealing with a complicated situation.