My World Dies Screaming

This film deals with a young gal who has bad dreams about a haunted house which have put her in a sanitarium and her husband is trying his best to help her with this problem.

The husband takes his wife to a house that looks exactly like the haunted house in her dreams and this is when the story becomes interesting with mysterious people making appearances who claim to be owners of the house and even the care taker of the house becomes a dark side to the story.

Good acting, with plenty of surprises and great for a 1958 film classic. Enjoy.

Terror in the haunted house resembles a William Castle horror film it has gimmicks,subliminal messages during the film.they flash images of skulls and cartoon monsters and even the word scream in blood red colors,but this movie is pretty good without the subliminal messages.its creepy and pretty entertaining,it stars Gerald Mohr who a few years later starred in the great b movie the angry red planet.and Cathy O'Donnell(related to Rosie?)and William Ching.a new bride is having visions of a haunted house,well nightmares and is later on a trip with her new husband to America from Switzerland.to an old plantation mansion that turns out to be the house from her nightmares, its kind of like the screaming skull only much better.i seen this years ago on VHS from rhino video when they redid all the subliminal messages.and if you run it in slow motion you can clearly see these goofy and cartoonish subliminal images.as a fan of b movies and old horror movies i enjoyed terror in the haunted house,even though it is not as great as the infamous house on haunted hill.but alas it is better then the screaming skull and yes the really inept hillbillies in the haunted house.i recommend terror in the haunted house.7 out of 10.

I will start off by saying that I, personally, enjoyed this movie VERY much. Yes...Sadly, I must place emphasis on the word "personally" because I seem to be the only experimental/nostalgic-viewer that shares this optimism...drag!

I praise this movie for it's decent, but at times in-consistent acting, music-score, and wonderful plot! The male-lead, Philip (Gerald Mohr) was VERY good through the picture especially. The female-lead (and ONLY feature female at that), Sheila (Cathy O'Donnell) had some dull and predictable character moments (characther moments not at all uncommon for Female roles in 1958).

As for the ***"Subliminal Messages"***, they were nothing more than a minor headache at best, and were used VERY sparingly. (Incedently, I own this movie on a Rhino Home Video cassette and took the liberty to view the "subliminal messaging" in slow motion). I found some of the ORIGINAL messages were quite vivid and disturbing once they were slowed-down, but it seems that AT SOME POINT later on, after Rhino Home Video had apparently bought rights to this movie, decided to implement their own messages during the last ten minutes before the climax...("Rent Rhino Videos Every Day" was my favorite) HAHA! Very funny, guys at Rhino! You sure know how to use media...(Kinda scary if you think about it)...

Anyway, after looking beyond the fact that, YES, this movie is OLD, you will discover a VERY true and stirring romance that I REALLY was able to identify with. The idea that you might have met your wife, or girlfriend, or loved-one many many years ago, then became suddenly separated from them during childhood (when young-love is the most impressionable and dream-like)...and then to have met that same person again in the future, not remembering who they were, and yet you fall in love with them just the same :)...if that makes sense!

Seriously, watch this film and try to imagine yourself in Philip's position. What if YOU searched high and low for your long lost loved-one, only to find them decades later in a deteriorating mental state...and only YOU can bring them back to reality! Very moving indeed, I love it!

Although the practice of using subliminal advertising--that is, flashing messages on a movie or TV screen for a fraction of a second, too quickly to register with the human brain but capable of having a subconscious effect--was banned by television stations and by the National Association of Broadcasters in 1958 (and, years later, was claimed to be ineffective), it wasn't in time to prevent the first big-screen film from using the technique. That picture, originally released under the artier and more appropriate title "My World Dies Screaming," and years later, for home viewing, as "Terror in the Haunted House" (a somewhat misleading appellation), turns out to be an interesting enough little film that hardly requires this tiresome gimmick (presented as "Psycho-Rama" here!). In it, we meet a pretty newlywed, Sheila, who has been going to a psychiatrist in Switzerland to cure her of recurring dreams involving an old house, and, most particularly, of a flight of steps in that house leading to a cobwebbed attic. And when Sheila's new husband, Philip, brings her to America to stay at that EXACT SAME HOUSE, her nightmares become a living reality, and the viewer is thrown into a state of confusion about whether Philip is trying to help his new bride or, a la "Gaslight," perhaps drive her insane....

For a cheaply made "B picture," "My World Dies Screaming" is surprisingly effective, and most of the credit for the film's success must surely go to Cathy O'Donnell in the lead. O'Donnell, who most viewers might remember from the 1946 classic "The Best Years of Our Lives" as well as for appearing in the cult item "They Live By Night" and the excellent film noir "Side Street" (both from 1949 and both costarring Farley Granger), is truly excellent here, lovely and appealing, and appearing in every single scene of the film. Gerald Mohr, playing Philip, gives a nicely ambiguous portrayal (many viewers will remember him from the following year's "The Angry Red Planet"), and the film's other three performers (Barry Bernard as Sheila's shrink, John Qualen as the house's uberstrange caretaker, and Bill Ching as Philip's cousin) are all fine as well. Harold Daniels directs his picture competently, eliciting chills on a regular basis, although it must be said that the film seems a bit eerier in its first half. Still, the mystery of Sheila's nightmares, and her familiarity with a house she's never been in, is a fascinating one, and keeps the viewer involved throughout; to the film's credit, the resolution of that mystery entails a surprisingly complex backstory that does manage to tie up every loose end. As to those subliminal messages, they ARE visible, although only a frame-by-frame viewing on your DVD player will reveal their contents. Basically, they consist of demon masks with the following captions: "Scream." "Scream Bloody Murder." "Prepare To Die." And "Die Die Die." (One message, very amusingly inserted by the DVD manufacturer, exhorts us to "Buy Rhino Videos Every Day"!) As I mentioned before, these flashes of...something become hokey after a while, and the film is good enough to stand on its own without them. It's nothing great, surely, but is an engaging entertainment nevertheless. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'd like to wrap up this little review and run down to the grocery store. For some strange reason, I've just developed a sudden urge to purchase popcorn, Goobers and Raisinets....

This one has some historical value do to the Psycho-Rama, all that means is it's the first movie ever that tries to add subliminal messages and images to the film. It's a bit comical to watch, at times almost distracting but the movie is good nevertheless.

This one has a two or three plot twists that will keep it from getting dull - pretty interesting story. The ending is not exactly what one would expect from a film like this... they didn't use the standard ending in a way that I expected anyway.

Sheila Wayne and Philip Tierney have just gotten married in Switzerland where she had been living for most all of her life. She's been seeing a psychiatrist while there about her bizarre nightmares but her new husband wants to take her to Florida so they go. Driving some back roads they come to a house, she screams in terror because that is the house in her nightmares. Philip insists they go inside and they meet up with a strange caretaker of the old house and then Philip insists to the caretaker they will take the place (rent it). And then our bizarre story begins.

I will say that Sheila is weird but Philip is even weirder even though he's the one that seems sorta normal yet very odd from the beginning.

I would say this film is worth watching if you like the older mystery films. Again, plenty of twists that are a bit unexpected.

8/10