It came to my attention recently that Christine Hadden of FASCINATION WITH FEAR was planning to retire someday in the picturesque, cliff-top abode depicted in the film THE DARK (2005). The problem was that Christine had picked the exact same place that I had been planning to eventually move into!
Luckily an east coast vs. east coast blogging war was averted when the two of us came up with a time-sharing compromise. I couldn't help wondering though, what if we hadn't come up with a solution to our dilemma, where would I live then? Below are my top ten slabs of horror real estate that I would gladly move into should the need arise. After you've given them a quick walk-through make sure you check out Christine's top ten choices HERE!
10.MODERN PROBLEMS (1980, The PSYCHO house)
Sure I love the PSYCHO house just like everybody else but there's no way I'm dealing with a motel filled with unseemly transients! In the alleged comedy MODERN PROBLEMS, CHEVY CHASE spends a weekend (along with DABNEY COLEMAN and MARY KAY PLACE) in what is in indeed, the one and only PSYCHO house; however, it's miraculously on a beach and there's no seedy motel to deal with. I could live in this joint for sure, especially if it comes with housekeeper NELL CARTER!
9.SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT (1974)
Hey, look at this pad; it's got a front porch for me to drink 40s on! I can almost see myself standing there as an old man in shorts and argyle socks telling the neighborhood kids to scram! Sources (IMDb) tell me that this fixer upper is located in Oyster Bay, Long Island. I'm going to start working on my accent now.
8.THE BOOGEY MAN (1980)
I love the BOOGEY MAN house and it comes with a well and a barn, so you can't beat that. This place resides in Chesapeake Bay, Maryland and just check out those windows up top there! Don't they remind you of another famous horror home? I'm ready to move in, right after I check my sneakers for mirror shards.
7.THE HUNGER (1983)
I know I should be trying to get out of the city but I can't sneeze at Miriam the Vampire's luxury New York digs in THE HUNGER. Urban life isn't so bad when you've got mad cash and a video camera security system at your front door! I know it doesn't look like much from the outside but vampires (perhaps because they spend so much time indoors) sure know a thing or two about interior decorating.
6.THE LADY IN WHITE (1988)
This place is a bit small for my needs but it's not without its charms. It's got a rustic storybook quality to it that I enjoy plus there's a nearby cliff that you can throw people off of!
5.THE UNINVITED (1944)
Speaking of cliffs, I know I should appreciate THE UNINVITED more than I do, it's got RAY MILLAND in it after all, but it's always been a smidge of a snore for me. Having made that embarrassing admission, I must say that I big time dig the house from the movie. Hmmm, maybe the place from the GHOST AND MRS. MUIR is more my speed.
4.LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH (1971)
This beautiful house is located in Essex, Connecticut; I used to live in Connecticut so adjustment should be a breeze. You must know by now that I am secretly a hippie and that I can entertain myself for hours strumming on a guitar and making grave stone rubbings. The locals are sure to be a problem but they'll get used to my playing THE BEST OF BREAD into the wee hours eventually.
3.THE FOG (1980)
Stevie Wayne sure knew how to live. I'm not sure that I like the idea of my front door being easily accessible to sea-ghouls but I'm not the kind of dummy who answers the door when somebody bangs on it with a hook either. Put it this way, if it comes with the K-A-B lighthouse I'm sold. Bodega (aka Antonio) Bay, California here I come!
2.THE ADDAMS FAMILY (1991)
This house is just is the ravens' knees and that's that. Plus, out of all my picks I believe this is the only one that comes with its own graveyard, which should come in handy. Who needs to yell at kids to get off your lawn when pouring a cauldron of boiling oil on their heads can get the same message across?
1.THE AMITYVILLE HORROR (1979)
It's just a lifetime dream of mine to live in the Amityville Horror house. Isn't it just the perfect place to set up Kindertrauma operations? This one was actually recently up for sale but I didn't have to count my Folgers can full of loose change to know that it was a tad out side my budget. (That reminds me, Aunt John you better remember to play my numbers today!) My first plan upon moving into this place was to restore its creepy devil eye windows. Then, I would have put two creepy Jody the pig blinking eye lights up in there to scare away the tourists. I wouldn't have been afraid to live in this, the most famous haunted house in the land. I'm used to black sludge pouring from my walls and I know how to hang a fly strip. (By the way, the above image is from the superior AMITYVILLE 2: THE POSSESSION from the best year God ever made… 1982!)
Yowza, that was a startlingly easy list to come up with. There's so much great horror real estate out there! The hard part is going to be picking just one! At least there will be no debate about which realtor to use!
Thanks for going on this tour with me kids, make sure you check out Christine's picks over at FASCINATION WITH FEAR right over HERE, she remembered all the great spots (Garth Manor, anyone?) that your Unk forgot!
I love this article!
How funny that I was watching the Hardy Boys last night (as I often do on Sundays) and they used the Psycho house as the main locale. Melanie Griffith is a foxy psychic who is drawn to the house and at one point one of the Hardy boys remarks, "Has Alfred Hitchcock seen this house?" Funny.
I have some TV movie houses I want to live in, but most especially the house in This House Possessed is the ULTIMATE cool pad. And then maybe Charles Sand's swinging bachelor pad in The Eyes of Charles Sand!
Cool choices, all!
The place I always wanted to live in, if I couldn't have the Bewitched house (LOL), was the store/apartment from Friday the 13th: The Series. LOVE that place and its layout. And hey, who couldn't use an evil-containing vault in the basement now and again?
This article is uncanny. As a child, I had pegged out all my future dream houses from horror movies and these were mostly them. Except you missed just one…the old English manor from WATCHER IN THE WOODS (complete with Bette Davis as an eerie neighbour).
I love this post. I too, would love to live in the house that is featured in 'The Uninvited'. Just please add electricity to the joint! No oil lamps for me. Also, the Addams Family house is a true mansion that I would love to live in. You can even let the cemetery stay. Just get rid of the judge in the neighboring house! If I can not get to live in these 2 houses, I have the ultimate abode for me. It is the apartment from 'Rosemary's Baby'. I just love this 2 bedroom apartment with eat-in-kitchen and window loveseat and fireplace in the livingroom. To live in Manhattan near Central Park and all the museums would be fantastic. I would just have to find another place to store the towels! Have a scary one!
I want the "Jessica" house – always loved that place!
I always loved the Amityville House. Everything about it's design and look is so beautiful. I could go on and on about this.
Ill take the original NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET house. I love when you watch horror movies and they live in these HUGE houses and have ONE kid (Another house worth mention is the faboo THE CHANGELING mansion. George C Scott doesnt even have ONE kid in that one! Oddly enough he lives in an apartment with his wife and kid and AFTER they get iced he moves into the huge ass mansion! What a selfish bastard that george C Scott is!)Â My Summer Home could be the house from BURNT OFFERINGS. Again – a family with ONE kid and they have this huge ass Vacation Home. It came with an (alleged) Old Lady in the attic but -hey!-it had a pool!
I always liked the Palmer house from "Twin Peaks". It has a nice white color: http://hookedonhouses.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Twin-Peaks-house-for-sale-300×200.jpg It also has concrete stairs leading up to the house from the sidewalk:
http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kx8w3jk7AY1qafowlo1_400.jpg
The only problem is the "frequent visitor" and I don't mean the white horse!Â
Besides my obvious love for the Psycho house, I think my favorite is the Jessica house. It has such great character!
While searching for houses for my end of the post, I found these great ones of that house:
http://www.thethirdangelsounded.com/LetsScareJessicaToDeath
Just awesome.
Thanks again for letting me play at your playground, so to speak 🙂
Here's the old house from "The Chair" Sadly Toonces stuck his face in the camera while I was taking the pic: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_FPLXIK0wH4c/SEdDzmf9KxI/AAAAAAAAAgE/d-5n9R92rB8/s400/Cat.JPG
I'd like to add a few:Â the Dunsmuir House in my current hometown of Oakland, CA (used in "Burnt Offerings," "You'll Like My Mother," "So I Married an Axe Murderer," and many more); the Hotel del Coronado (from 1973's split-screenzavaganza "Wicked, Wicked"), the vaguely-Mexican restaurant-ish house in "The Spell," the mansion in "Sweet, Sweet Rachel," the outbuilding/studio from "The Norliss Tapes," and the house from the 2005 "Amityville" remake (which is in Silver Lake, WI, two towns from where I grew up).
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Oh, and half a shout-out to Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum.
Wow. I never realized that was the same house in all three movies! As luck would have it I have all three of those movies (I had a huge crush on Mike Meyers in the 90s ) so now I feel like watching em back to back to back
Okay, so I obviously missed this when it was first posted, but I just had to put in my two cents.
I love this list. Beautiful, scenic homes with a lot of character. However, I am very disappointed that neither list gives even an honorable mention to The Overlook Hotel from "The Shining". I was so certain I would see it here that I was a bit shocked when I got to the end of the list.
While I have to admit that I preferred Stanley Kubrick's movie over the Stephen King mini-series (you just can't beat the performance that Jack Nicholson delivered), I prefer King's vision of The Overlook. Inspired by The Stanley Hotel, King wrote one of my all-time favorite books. Fantastic. 🙂
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Stanley_Hotel_Estes_Park_CO.jpg
Great article. Although I would like to point out that the house in The Amityville Horror movie was not the one for sale, it was the REAL house that was for sale and it looks a bit different now.
As for my pick, I think I would go with the house from Let's Scare Jessica to Death even though the interior scenes were shot in a different house.
Summer_782,
You are right the Overlook is amazing! (Thanks for that link!) I think my reasoning for not including it here is because it's a Hotel rather than a home.
If I'm allowed to include hotels then it's going right to the top of my list!
Ryan,
That house in LSJTD is amazing. I saw a picture of it somewhere today and it Still looks just as cool!
I had no idea that the interiors were a different house! Thanks for that info!