Not the best film ever made (not that it was meant to be), but Oliver Reed was very good, Karen Black was a bit strange ....But the Chauffeur took the whole film to a creepy level beyond creepy.I remember seeing this when I was quite young, and that chauffeur caused endless nightmares.Certainly worth a watch for the whole atmosphere.

"Burnt Offerings" is a haunted house movie, not reviewed very kindly among horror fans, and it does kind of lay itself open for this by being a bit daft. Basically, a not-so happy family rent out a HUGE empty mansion for the summer, from very kindly caretakers and for next to nothing (Why is it so cheap? What's the catch? Oh please...). Soon, they are turning on each other and terrible things are afoot. Will they escape alive?I won't reveal the secret of the house in Burnt Offerings, just in case a handful of people wish to find it out first hand, but be aware that the title is completely meaningless! What you should know in advance, though, is that Karen Black, Oliver Reed and Bette Davis (plus small boy) have to be the most unlikely family unit ever in existence - they are all nothing like each other. I know this is supposed to be a dysfunctional family, but there isn't an ounce of screen magic between any of them, they all act like they are not even on the same screens as each other, let alone in the same film. Without this important chemistry, you may find you don't have the slightest interest in the fate of this unlikeable bunch, as none of the characters are even particularly nice people: Black is a whiney drudge, Reed is a thug, and Bette Davis plays almost no important part at all.Apart from the quite picturesque looking house at the centre of all the trouble, there isn't really a lot of on screen excitement to get carried away with either. There are very few shock or horror scenes, and the very low level of evil atmosphere marks this down as more of a "made-for-TV" chiller rather than the big budget theatrical release it is supposed to be. Mind you it was created by TV veteran Dan Curtis, who has a very impressive TV success legacy to his name, but maybe that is exactly what seems to be keeping it rooted in this understated territory. Now I can enjoy a low key thriller, but with all the rather grand presentation, I felt let down that nothing really dazzling ever actually happened.There are however, some good moments. All the characters seem to be menaced in ways that seem tailor made to prey on their personal fears (Reed's visions are of a creepy hearse driver which actives painful memories of his mother's death). This personal manipulation is a nice idea, but it's not new, as characters being preyed on by something that "knows what scares you the most" is an old horror staple, already used a decade earlier in "The Haunting", a film which this movie often draws comparisons with. Still, some of it works. Reed has one good scene when he appears driven to quite roughly (and realistically) drown the young son in the swimming pool - I wondered for a moment whether the boy's struggles were actually acting or not! Black's fate is a bit more whimsical, she appears to drift into reveries that connect with the former residents of the house and ends up moping over old photos and spending all day in the attic. And as mentioned, Bette Davis has an insult of a role that simply sees her fall prone to some degenerative affliction and become bed-ridden and unintelligible.The main problem (and it's one that the film is not alone in), is that there is no reason why these people don't just pack up their stuff and leave. The script still gives us all the various excuses, but surely when lives are very obviously at risk, they would just get out? And when they finally do manage this, the script STILL engineers a way to get them to follow each other back inside, i.e. "She's been gone too long, I'll just go back inside too and check on her...arghhh!"...Groan!Sorry, it's just not exciting or horrifying enough to satisfy horror or haunted house fans. The house is elegant rather than creepy, and the scares are thinly served. Watch it only if bored, or if any of the cast are favourite actors of yours.

This movie was so bizarre, but it held my attention to the very end. I loved the home - it was gorgeous, especially after it kept regenerating itself. I loved Eileen Heckart and Burgess Meredith. They were so delightfully charming, eccentric, yet creepy at the same time. I found the premise of the movie very interesting: A house slowly steals someone's vitality, causing that person to become at the very least injured and at the most, it makes them weak enough that they die.I loved how Karen Black's character became slowly obsessed and consumed by the old Victorian home. Her descent into obsession was so subtle and only really became obvious when she started dressing like a Victorian woman and flipped out about the idea of someone being in Mrs. Allardyce's sitting room. I rather guessed her eventual fate. The scene that tipped me off was when she was seen eating the food she had brought up for the old woman that was in the bedroom.Oliver Reed's character was very interesting. He was the reasonable one who instinctively knew something was "off" about the house. His scene with his son Danny in the pool was very scary. At first I was confused why Bette Davis seemed so upset with his horseplay with Danny until he started holding his head down under the water. I didn't really get what was up with the car and the creepy chauffeur, only that it seemed to be some traumatic childhood memory Reed's character had. That chauffeur would give anyone nightmares though. Then poor Reed's fate at the end of the film... Wow! How gruesome. I did not expect it at all. And his poor son.I loved Bette Davis' character. Even though she was a minor character, she imbued her part with such panache. She would be a fun aunt to have. Then my god, what the makeup department did to her when she was having the life sucked from her body.This was a great film with a very surprising and gruesome ending. I can't help but feel that this film would make a great double feature with the 1975 version of The Stepford Wives. If you think that this film has much in common with "The Shining", be aware that Stephen King was inspired by the original novel before he wrote his own.

Does your house need a face-lift? Then, take a little tip from brother and sister Burgess Meredith and Eileen Heckart. Rent it out for the summer to a nice married couple with a small child and just let the house take over. That's exactly what happens here, and boy, no plastic surgeon has the ability to do what this house does. Karen Black and Oliver Reed, two cult favorites of the 1970's, have done some weird films in their time, but other than a T.V. movie where Black is chased by a little African doll with a knife, they don't rank anywhere near as frightening as this. Sure, Reed scared the bajeebers out of kids being mean to Oliver Twist and Black had us frantic when she announced that there was nobody flying the plane, but now, she's got something serious to want to desperately fly out of.Literally, the house comes alive, as do several ghosts, with one of the most frightening swimming pools ever in the movies. Bette Davis adds a touch of class, not camp here, as Black's kindly aunt who comes for a visit and finds more than she bargained for on a holiday. The spirit of a deadly chauffeur haunts both her and her great grand-nephew (Lee Montgomery) while Reed and Black slowly go batty on their own as the evil spirits surrounding the house literally take over. This is severe horror at its scariest, a "Poltergeist" way before that horror classic came out and one that will tingle your spine in ways its never been tingled before. Anthony James may not be a household name, but the chauffeur he plays is as spooky a character to ever appear in a horror film and may haunt your dreams if you watch this right before going to bed. This is a great horror follow-up to the original "Dark Shadows" and its movies for director Dan Curtis.