This film doesn't get mentioned much, but it is a classic---it manages to be both hilarious and terrifying, and very satisfyingly so. It's a crazy take on the city slicker encountering a clan of inbred backwoods folk. The darkness of the story combined with the frantic pacing and classic farce set-ups really works, and the lack of musical score actually emphasizes the clamminess of the atmosphere.
The goofy and murderous family is of course profoundly dysfunctional (though the term wasn't thought of then), and the classic "old dark house," with its cellars and hidden passages, as almost the sole setting eventually seems like a metaphor for damaged and torturous relationships . Although there are a few disturbing scenes of abuse of a "teched" daughter, somehow within the over-all context of comic hysteria they are appropriate. Much of the film's success is due to MacMurray's impeccable comic timing. There's also great matching of reaction shots for Peter Whitney's turn as twins Mert and Bert.
The goofy and murderous family is of course profoundly dysfunctional (though the term wasn't thought of then), and the classic "old dark house," with its cellars and hidden passages, as almost the sole setting eventually seems like a metaphor for damaged and torturous relationships . Although there are a few disturbing scenes of abuse of a "teched" daughter, somehow within the over-all context of comic hysteria they are appropriate. Much of the film's success is due to MacMurray's impeccable comic timing. There's also great matching of reaction shots for Peter Whitney's turn as twins Mert and Bert.