In the late 1950s, two very different streams of British horror were simmering just below the surface. The more famous of these was a return to Gothic classics but with more blood and overt sexuality as championed by Hammer Studios and their seminal feature The Curse of Frankenstein (1957). That same year, however, a more subtle, usually modern-set, and atmospheric brand of horror also began in England with Night of the Demon, followed by films like The Innocents (1960), City of the Dead (1960), Night of the Eagle (aka Burn Witch, Burn—1962), and The Haunting (1963).
These films revel in mood, psychology, and ambiguity and are in many ways the heirs of the films produced by Val Lewton at RKO in the 1940s. Of these, Night of the Demon has had the longest journey from nearly forgotten and critically dismissed to a certified classic.
The backbone of Night of the Demon is similar to the M.R. James story, “Casting of the Runes,” upon which the film was based, with a few deviations. The film begins with a desperate Professor Henry Harrington (Maurice Denham) confronting cult leader Dr. Julian Karswell (Niall MacGinnis), whom he has been investigating. While leaving Karswell’s estate, Harrington dies in what his American protégé, Dr. John Holden (Dana Andrews), believes is a horrible accident. Also returned to England from America is Harrington’s niece, Joanna (Peggy Cummins), who soon discovers information that leads her to believe that her uncle’s death was supernatural. Eventually, Holden and Harrington join forces to discover the truth, he from a place of staunch skepticism and she from a place of belief. Holden runs afoul of Karswell himself and slowly comes to believe, with the help of Joanna and Karswell’s mother (Athene Seyler), that he is on a path to the same fate as Professor Harrington.
The story offers a great deal of space for explorations of belief and unbelief, along with plenty of opportunities for suspense and visual flair, which is where the major behind-the-scenes figures come into play. Tasked with adapting the M.R. James story was Charles Bennett, a frequent collaborator with the Master of Suspense Alfred Hitchcock during his British period in the 1930s, writing some of his best early films, including The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), The 39 Steps (1935), Young and Innocent (1937), and Foreign Correspondent (1940). Some of the hallmarks of Hitchcock appear in Night of the Demon, including trains, a sense of voyeurism, and a wicked sense of humor.
Added to this are aspects found in many of Val Lewton’s best films, appropriate considering that style was created in collaboration with director Jacques Tourneur, who made Cat People (1942), I Walked with a Zombie (1943), and The Leopard Man (1943) with the producer. Night of the Demon is sometimes called “the best Val Lewton movie not made by Val Lewton,” and this is an understandable statement considering the many parallels to the films he produced. Like those films, Night of the Demon is set in the present day, has a distinct film noir quality, and, though she is not the protagonist, Joanna Harrington is an educated and professional woman. Some of the more specific Lewtonian qualities of the film include jump scares, a “night walk,” a cat, and a cult.
The jump scare in horror was, for all practical purposes, invented by Lewton and Tourneur for Cat People, when a bus suddenly screeches into frame, and for years the tactic was called the “Lewton Bus.” In Night of the Demon, the jump scare takes the form of two children in masks jumping out from behind a tree, and a limb suddenly falling into frame during the night walk. The night walk was a mainstay of Lewton films, with the most famous appearing in Cat People, The Leopard Man, and The Seventh Victim (1943), with characters being followed by a heard but unseen menace.
Here, John Holden walks through the woods surrounding Karswell’s mansion and is pursued by a fireball in the sky. As in the earlier films, this is the central set piece of Night of the Demon. Cats often played key roles in Lewton films, as should be clear from many of the titles alone. When Holden goes snooping around Karswell’s home, an ordinary housecat, Karswell’s familiar, turns into a leopard and attacks him. Finally, the film features a cult that is very much like that found in The Seventh Victim, though here it is a group of poor farmers held under the sway of Karswell rather than a coven made up of the wealthy and powerful.
Night of the Demon features so many memorable sequences that demand attention that it is difficult to avoid spoiling the whole film. But because it is, after all these decades, still an underseen cult film, I will highlight only a few. In one, Karswell conjures up a lightning storm complete with a vicious gale that stretches Holden’s skepticism nearly to the breaking point. After bringing him inside, Karswell warns Holden that he only has three days to live and does so while removing the clown makeup he had been wearing to entertain the village children. It is a chilling juxtaposition of benevolence and menace.
Another very memorable scene is a séance, organized by Mrs. Karswell, meant to warn John and Joanna about the dangers posed by her son. It features a truly great, showstopping, single-scene performance by Reginald Beckwith as Mr. Meek, who channels several different characters in the scene. Another is Holden’s presentation to a group of academics about devil worship with former cult member Rand Hobart (Brian Wilde), the only man who has apparently escaped the demon that killed Harrington. Under hypnosis, Hobart discusses the fearful inner workings of Karswell’s cult and recounts his experience on his own night of the demon.
Beyond the incisive writing, memorable performances, and remarkable direction, the film is filled with atmosphere. Though it takes place in late October, it feels like a “deep autumn” movie. That time of year when the days have grown achingly short, the once crisp fallen leaves have become damp and soggy, the half-bare trees reach out their fingers like clawed skeletons, and the air itself is filled with monsters. It is the perfect season for horror as the reminders of our most primeval fears are all around us: darkness, decay, and death. There are deep shadows and mist-filled woods, barren branches and fog-enshrouded cityscapes and fields.
The design by the great Ken Adam, with one of his first credits as Production Designer, is striking and moody, enhancing this atmosphere. This is particularly true of his interiors, specifically Karswell’s home, featuring a grand entryway, an attic, and a study, and the interior of the farmhouse where Karswell’s cult meets. Adam would go on to become one of the greatest production designers of all time, creating the look of James Bond movies, from MI:6 to those unforgettable villains’ lairs, and of course, the iconic war room from Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove (1964).
To this day, one persistent controversy surrounds Night of the Demon: to show the monster or not to show the monster. By most accounts, the fire demon was shown in the original script, and Ken Adam drew a sketch that appears in the film, in a book about witchcraft and demonology that Karswell’s mother shows Joanna. This more or less proves that there was always an intention to show the demon at some point in the film. The question becomes how much? On one side of the argument are those who believe it is vital to show the reality of the demon as would be consistent with the work of M.R. James, which rejected writing off the supernatural as mere psychology in favor of a more literal medieval approach.
On the other extreme are those who believe the demon should not be shown at all, in favor of the Val Lewton approach of keeping the monster in the shadows of the mind. After the release of the film and the criticisms surrounding showing the demon, Tourneur gave several interviews with varying versions of the story, suggesting that showing the demon was forced upon him by producer Hal E. Chester. The veracity of this claim has been questioned over the years, but the reality will likely never be known. I personally fall somewhere in the middle on the issue. I would prefer the demon not be shown in the sequence at the beginning of the film in which Harrington dies. I feel this would better preserve the film’s central mystery. I also believe that seeing the demon is vital to the climax. Saving the reveal for the ending would make for an even greater moment of terror at the end of the film.
The other controversy is the execution of the monster. Film scholar Sir Christopher Frayling noted that he feels the closeups of the creature look like “a bunch of bananas,” but also feels the more distant shots of it are effective. The puppet created for the film is a bit janky, even by 1957 standards, but it is an interesting and, as time goes on, even iconic design. As noted by critic Kim Newmann, it looks something like a medieval woodcut. “If you are playing the rational explanation game, if it’s supposed to be a suggestive image,” he noted in an interview about the film, “it is entirely credible that this would be what people would imagine a demon looks like.” This is an astute observation, as the worlds of M.R. James’s short stories are often steeped in the lore of that period.
For decades, Night of the Demon was known only by the most devoted of horror fans and seen by even fewer. Those who had seen it, more often than not, had only seen the truncated, 82-minute version of the film released to theaters on a double bill with 20 Million Miles to Earth, an American kaiju from the same year. It is believed by film scholars that, in order to recoup its expenses after receiving an “X” certificate (no children under 16) in Britain, it needed to be placed on a double bill, as was the popular trend of the day with genre movies. Over the years, the film has gained its audience and is at last widely available in its full 96-minute version thanks to its restoration and release by Britain’s Indicator Blu-ray label.
It remains an unusual film for its era and feels simultaneously like a throwback to the previous decade and a presage of what was to come in the next decade. Looking even further ahead, it seems to have influenced the kinds of visually striking, character-based horror films of A24 but also has an apparent connection, particularly in their respective climactic scenes, with Sam Raimi’s Drag Me to Hell (2009). All that said, Night of the Demon is a singular work that has surprising power to this very day.
This brings me back to where I began, that Night of the Demon is a film of tensions. An “A” film in the guise of a “B” picture. A subtle and atmospheric film of the 1940s style made during the “show me the monster” era of the 1950s. Above all, it is a film that explores one of the great tensions of human existence—to believe or not to believe. Not to contradict Hamlet, but perhaps that is the real question.
Night of the Demon is currently available to stream on Midnight Pulp, Roku Channel, and Tubi.
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