THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

The Fall of the House of Usher (La Chute de la Maison Usher), based on the short story of the same name by Edgar Allan Poe, cannot be considered just a transposition of Poe’s text, but represents a much more complex attempt. The film is in fact built on a collection of several stories – including the title story, The Oval Portrait, Ligeia… – and not only immerses us in Poe’s disturbing pages, but manages to render the claustrophobic vein and sense of fatality in every frame. Poe’s hallucinatory atmospheres become images that transform natural elements into disturbing events: the wind, the half-light, objects that move without being touched. The film thus achieves effects similar to expressionism but using completely different methods, from lighting to the use of slow motion. For the making of this film, Epstein, a great theoretician and filmmaker, used the then 28-year-old Luis Bunuel as assistant director.