An Ode to The Haunting of Hill House’s Bent-Neck Lady

Recently, I was asked, “What is the scariest movie you’ve ever seen?” Being a massive horror film fan—living for the thrill of a good scary movie in a darkened room, hoping that I’m unable to guess who the killer is so that I can fully enjoy the final act of the movie and their reveal—it was hard for me to think up a film that really scared me. Hulu’s No One Will Save You was probably the closest I’ve been to “on the edge of my seat” in the longest time, but it was a fun watch overall and left me with many thoughts and comparisons to Buffy The Vampire Slayer’s episode “Hush” (also pretty disturbing). So I wracked my brain: “What is the scariest thing I’ve ever seen?”

It hit me that the most truthful answer is probably Poltergeist, but only because I watched it when I was in 6th grade. I also have an irrational fear of clowns (which I thought I was free of when sitting down to watch the horror classic, but I guess you’re never really safe from clowns, are you?). I had to sleep in my mom’s bed for days after that. But I really wanted to share something I’d watched as an adult. And then I realized that the scariest or most disturbing thing I’d seen in the last decade was probably from The Haunting of Hill House.