Haunting is “in the House” -from “The Uninvited”- Tonight!

Tonight on MeTV, we are thrilled to be able to present to you what actually was one of the first  movies to treat ghosts seriously- as a brother and sister purchase their dream house, only to have it revealed as the site of a nightmare in- "The Uninvited"!

We meet the Fitzgeralds- Roderick and Pamela- a brother and sister who stumble upon what appears to be a vacant estate- and like the sprawling house so much, they decide to buy it. The owner, one Commander Beech, seems to be willing to hand it over for a bargain price- while his niece, a lovely young woman named Stella, seems reluctant to have the place sold.

Roderick and Pamela move in- and notice a few strange things- a studio room, which Roderick will use as his den to compose music, seems to always be rather cold, no matter how warm it is outside- and, their dog, as well as the housekeeper's cat, balks at going upstairs in the place. And then, the nightly mysterious cries and sobs,coming out of nowhere, begin...

Young Stella wants to visit with the Fitzgeralds at the old house (which her mother and father lived in, until a tragic accident)- but her grandfather the Commander is against it. She goes there in spite (and because she is getting involved with Roderick)- and the result is more bizarre supernatural happenings.A tense seance, a visit to an institution run by a cold, iron-willed woman, and the spirits of the dead lead to life-threatening danger!

This 1944 film has been called "a sophisticated ghost story"- and is a great suspense film, featuring Ray Milland as Roderick. We'll fill you in on the rest of the cast, and the hit song that the film spawned- not to mention adding a song of our own.

...which leads to a point we need to address. "The Uninvited" runs about 99 minutes in its original form. If you take out the commercial time we have in every show, that leaves the time for the movie and our usual Sven shtick at...about 93 minutes. Yes, the movie alone is more than that. To accommodate the film, we have limited the amount of Sven shtick time for this program, as well as doing a very careful editing job on the film. Allow me to explain- we do not just arbitrarily hack the film up, as some stations have a tendency to do-we carefully remove a handful of seconds here, twenty seconds there, etc.- and try NOT to take out anything that is essential to the story. Sometimes, we may have to take out a short scene that we may love- but that the actual story itself can do without (for fans of this film, you will realize that one very short character piece, though charming,had to be removed for time). This type of editing takes much more production time- but our whole point is to not make the cuts obvious, not disrupt the story, and maintain the experience of the film. In a case like this, I wanted to be able to show you this movie, rather than dismiss it for being much too long for our time slot. I think most of you who have been watching TV for a fair amount of time realize that most movies run on broadcast TV  throughout the years have  indeed edited- but we try to  avoid it whenever possible, and, when we have to do it-it is NEVER without careful consideration. I recall a viewer taking me to task for removing a Lou Costello pratfall from one of their movies- a typical, done by Lou "just to make the crew laugh" type bit of business that didn't even make sense with the action going on at the time- necessary to bring the movie in at the correct run time. We've learned you can't please everyone- but we at least TRY to do a job that will not disrupt your viewing pleasure. I hope that will be the case for this film.

"The Uninvited" invites you to watch on MeTV tonight at 10 pm eastern/pacific, 9 pm central, or check local listings. Our fans in Baltimore will be happy to know that WBAL has heard their complaints about pre-emption- and  are giving fans what they want- the entire Sven show will be seen, starting at 11 pm! We appreciate  WBAL listening to the many fans who contacted them.

In Chicago, you can enjoy "The Incredible Shrinking Man" on WCIU, the U, at 11 am!

Don't forget- you can come see me tomorrow -Sunday evening- at the Creepy Hallow Halloween Park in Frankfort, IL- this is our third year  to appear there, and we hope you'll come out to visit with us! All the info is available under our "appearances" tab.

Speaking of which- my heartfelt thanks to the amazing crowd who showed up last night for the Museum of Broadcasting "35 years as Svengoolie" event. It means a lot to me that so many people showed up, and showed such affection and respect for a simple rubber-chicken -target like myself. I hope to write another full blog about the event, but, for now, just wanted to say- thank you!

And the haunting bits just keep on coming- join us for "The Uninvited" tonight!