Behind the Couch

Written and directed by Mary Harron, and adapted from the YA novel by Rachel Klein, The Moth Diaries tells of Rebecca (Sarah Bolger), a teenager at an all-girls boarding school who begins to suspect that the new student, Ernessa (Lily Cole), is a vampire. Throughout, Harron re-works and updates many Gothic traditions and tropes, adding a rich depth to proceedings and evoking a suitably haunting atmosphere.  While the story can be read as an updated interpretation of Sheridan Le Fanu’s Gothic novella Carmilla (1872), Harron’s screenplay places first and foremost the ever-shifting relationships and dynamics between the group of friends. New girl Ernessa might be a vampire, but Harron doesn’t let that detract from the realigning allegiances between friends sparked by her arrival at the school. Ernessa serves as a catalyst, driving a wedge between best friends Rebecca and Lucy (Sarah Gadon). Harron’s script delves into the intensity and complexity of the friendships forged at the boar...

When Rose Nemser's (Odessa Young) husband attains a teaching assistant position at Bennington College, Vermont, the couple are invited to stay with Professor Stanley Hyman (Michael Stuhlbarg) and his wife, the infamous mystery and horror author Shirley Jackson (Elizabeth Moss), whose most recent short story 'The Lottery' is causing quite a stir. Before long, tensions mount within the house and Shirley begins work on a new novel about a missing girl...  Adapted by screenwriter Sarah Gubbins from Susan Scarf Merrell’s 2014 novel of the same name, Shirley is an unusual biopic that sidesteps the conventions of the form as it is more inspired by Jackson’s work than her actual life. Merrell’s novel, equal parts dark literary thriller and enthralling love letter to Shirley Jackson and her haunting body of work, is a fictionalised account of a period in Jackson’s life. Like the novel, this adaptation takes as much artistic licence as it perfectly evokes the atmosphere of Jackson’...

Adapted from Shirley Jackson's 1962 Gothic novel of the same name, director Stacie Passon's sophomore feature film tells of the intense relationship between two sisters who, along with their ailing uncle (Crispin Glover), live in a large, lonely house on a vast estate outside a small New England town. Several years prior, the older sister, Constance (Alexandra Daddario), was acquitted of the murder of her parents, by poisoning, and the sisters are shunned by the townspeople. When their estranged cousin Charles (Sebastian Stan) arrives unannounced for a short stay, his prying presence shatters the sisters' claustrophobic little world and threatens to unearth long buried family secrets. Admirers of Jackson's novel, and her literary work in general, will find much to appreciate here. The screenplay by Mark Kruger is a very faithful adaptation, and, true to the source material, its main themes also centre on isolation, familial dysfunction/disintegration and the perse...

A bronze statue of Frankenstein's Creature created by Geneva artist collective KLAT, not only represents the fictional character, but “the figure of the vagrant or the marginal.” Published in January 1818, Mary Shelley’s classic Gothic novel Frankenstein turns 200 years old this month. It tells of Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young scientist whose highly unorthodox experiments create a living, sentient creature assembled from the parts of stolen human cadavers. Horrified by his creation, Victor rejects and abandons the creature, who eventually seeks revenge on his creator. Mary began writing what would become her debut novel when she was 18. Published several years later, Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus became one of the cornerstones of Gothic literature. With its themes concerning the destructive pursuit of knowledge and dangerous ambition, morality regarding scientific/technological advancement, existentialism and societal isolation, Frankenstein continues to...