Comfort Food – It doesn’t have to be Halloween to be in the mood for a ghost story.

The Uninvited (1944, Lewis Allen) ****
An old-fashioned romantic ghost story with Ray Milland and Ruth Hussey playing a brother and sister who buy a haunted house replete with every trope of the genre; also features an early performance from Gail Russell. To my knowledge this is one of the first Hollywood films of the to portray a haunting as an authentic supernatural event; rather than for laughs (The Ghost Busters, The Ghost Goes West, Topper, etc.) The American pop standard, “Stella By Starlight” was written for this movie. Ray Milland narrates the opening sequence, "They call them the haunted shores, these stretches of Devonshire and Cornwall and Ireland which rear up against the westward ocean. Mists gather here, and sea fog, and eerie stories. That’s not because there are more ghosts here than in other places, mind you. It’s just that people who live hereabouts are strangely aware of them." Beautifully shot the film was nominated for an AA for best cinematography.