Wow, some films just age like fine wine and this is one of them! I think I love it much more than when I watched it for the first time years ago. I must also reread Shirley Jackson's iconic novel one day.

A group of strangers arrive at the supposedly haunted house, invited by one doctor planning to check if it's really haunted. The protagonist, Eleanor, thinks of this visit as a vacation she's never had, having to sacrifice her youth tending to her demanding, sick mother and now being seen as a burden by her own uncaring sister that has a family of her own, something Eleanor never got to have.

Eleanor is LONELY, so profoundly lonely that she can't help but feel immediately attached to the three strangers. She is starved for any crumbs of affection. But she is also hurt by any sarcasm, perceiving it as cruelty. Julie Harris's performance is so poignant, I think it's truly Oscar-worthy. Patricia Neal was also a great actress but her performance in Hud can't match this one in my eyes (but of course The Haunting got no nominations; in the year when Tom Jones, Cleopatra, and How the West Was Won triumphed... talk about films that aged not nearly as well!).

The Haunting features a voiceover monologue (a device I often dislike) done right, with Eleanor being so trapped inside her own head that it's crucial to the plot that we hear her berating herself too.

If you are afraid of ghosts, this is one terrifying film. I got literal chills many times. It is so effective without resorting to gore (there is not a drop of blood being shed throughout the whole runtime). And the set design, sound design and cinematography certainly help to make some scares feel real and threatening.

This is one of the best traditional "ghost story" films ever made and if you like this subgenre of horror, it's a must-see.

Its lesson stays relevant: wherever you go, you will still be there. But perhaps it's better to drive past the place that screams "danger" and look for happiness elsewhere. Or is it? Offering distressing ambiguity till the end, The Haunting provokes us to rethink our understanding of ghosts.

And the last sentence is certainly the hardest mic drop since Psycho a few years before.