https://vo.rs/tags/m.r.-james/Latest from the M.R. James desk at vo.rs.Hugo -- gohugo.ioenThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.Fri, 15 Dec 2023 08:00:00 +0000https://vo.rs/screen/night-of-the-demon-the-runes-and-the-restraint/<p>There is a famous argument buried inside <em>Night of the Demon</em> (1957), and you can watch both sides of it in the finished film, sitting uneasily next to each other. Jacques Tourneur — the director who, working for Val Lewton at RKO, had taught Hollywood the power of the unseen in <a href="https://vo.rs/screen/cat-people-1942-val-lewton-and-the-terror-you-dont-see/">Cat People</a> and <a href="https://vo.rs/screen/i-walked-with-a-zombie-the-jane-eyre-of-the-undead/">I Walked With a Zombie</a> — wanted to make a horror film in which the audience is never certain the demon exists at all. The producer, Hal E. Chester, wanted a monster he could put on the poster. The film we have is the wreckage and the triumph of that disagreement, and it remains one of the greatest British horror films ever made, in spite of and because of the fight at its centre.</p>Fri, 15 Dec 2023 08:00:00 +0000