“Burnt Offerings” (1976) starring Karen Black, Oliver Reed and Bette Davis

It scared my eyes crossed!

I saw it at the drive-in.

I swą it too. Scared the life out of me.

That house featured in so many made-for-tv movies in the 1970s and 80s.

Bette Davis was good in it, I will say that for her.

I never saw Harvest Home. Was La Davis good in that one, too?

R3 this wasn’t a made for tv movie

I wasn’t that crazy about the film. Lots of freaky things happened but it didn’t add up to anything.

I’ve heard the book is different -and better.

Didn’t add up to anything? The old house itself was trying to kill these people because when it killed people the house would self-rejuvenate and fix itself up.

A good thread about Burnt Offerings from a couple years ago

R9 why do you have so much time on your hands that you always look for threads from years ago? Surely you have something else to do besides post on here, LPSG, Reddit and weird sites 24/7.

....

Full movie (not great quality).

"Butt Offerings" (2025)- Lindsay Lohan stars as Hope Hicks, the doggedly faithful acolyte who survived a harrowing descent into the Trump cult. Donald Trump: John Goodman: Melania: Sofia Vergara. Ivanka: Paris Hilton. Mike Pence: James Spader. Directed by Osgood Perkins.

I never bought Reed & the wonky eyed Karen Black as a couple, but then when Bette Davis swans in, that was just too much. That said, I love just the ridiculous campiness of it all

I distinctly remember Rhona Barrett setting a strip of film on fire during her segment on Good Morning America to express how bad she thought the movie was.

The Crows have Eyes 1?

Rona Barrett, the doyenne of good taste and subtlety.

<- Groan 'N Bare-It...

The movie is entertaining. And that beautiful house...

Bette starts out stylish and blonde and descends into crazy gray hagdom.

Oliver Reed was the classic batshit drunken Brit.

Love this film. Bette HATED making it. She really laid into Karen Black and also despised Oliver Reed, whose room was across the hall from hers in their hotel. She claimed to have had the hotel place SIX locks on her door to ensure he would leave her alone. From an on-set interview with Rex Reed:

[quote]The director's daughter on this film committed suicide and we had to shut down a week. Then the camera man was fired because we couldn't see one thing on the screen, the rushes were so dark. That cost us two weeks of re-takes. Karen Black showed up six months pregnant, so they had to re-make her clothes because they didn't fit. She changes her makeup in the middle of a scene so nothing matches on the screen, she sleeps all day, never goes to rushes to see what she looks like and you can't hear one bloody thing she says on set... Oliver Reed comes piling into the hotel at 5 a.m., and he's on the set at 6 with the hangover of the world.

[quote]I just spent the last two days writhing and dying and looking like the wrath of God, and I planned the hair, the aging, the lines under the eyes, the falls on the floor—I spent weeks working out the movements for my death scene. They all think I'm crazy to work so hard. At 6 last night after dying all day I was so exhausted I couldn't move, and my makeup man wasn't even there to take my makeup off. He was out in the front yard playing cricket! I tell you, my kind of professionalism is DEAD!

I saw this as a child at an event called Six Screams of Terror or something like that. Midway thru a man in a Frankenstein mask came out by the screen and kids ran screaming.

I have the DVD. In the Commentary, Karen Black and Dan Curtis barely mentioned Oliver Reed. I was a naive junior high boy at the time, and I knew Reed was a drunken asshole.

I saw this film at the theater with my two cousins and we saw it with a fun crowd. Everyone seemed to have enjoyed the film but that damn limousine driver scared the crap out of me twice. I thought Bette Davis was excellent, as she tends to be in most of her films. Her death scene was very disturbing.

Say what you will about Queen Bette but in her defense, she does come from an age where there was a certain standard of professionalism. I believe her when she talks about Oliver Reed and KarenBlack. Neither of them had good reputations as professionals.

This guy toured the grounds of the house a few years ago. Looks like a new family needs to move in to help restore the pool

I do too, R24. I think the lack in professionalism from the later generations angered and confused Bette. She didn’t talk about it in her biographies, but I read that he would bang on her door asking if she wanted to have a drink at night and she would never open because she was afraid of him.

It didn’t sound like Bette’s usual exaggeration with men wanting to screw her when she was older and I believed it.

She did not take to Karen Black either. She said she treated her like she was her favorite relic and of course Bette didn’t receive that kindly.

Oops, r21 did this better. Sorry, guys.

The film's climax is chilling!

Oliver was definitely a drunken slob on the set of this. He also apparently rode Bette's food cart down the hallway of the hotel and broke several plates which royally pissed her off. As a peace offering, he gifted her a dove and a bouquet of roses.

I don't think Karen Black was intentionally a trouble though and I'd give her a little bit of slack—in her case, I think it was more her natural eccentricity combined with being pregnant that probably irked Bette. Oliver's behavior, however, was really inexcusable.

[quote] As a peace offering, he gifted her a dove...

Great. Bird shit all over the place.

It's a very creepy movie, although the way they kill off the Lee H. Montgomery child character is pretty hilariously random. (He gets killed by a falling chimney!)

I remember the chauffeur as being very scary,. However, I once saw a shirtless photo of him where he showed off a six-pack and I realized he was sort of fuckable.

Bette reported hearing "strange noises" coming out of Oliver's hotel suite when he invited a group of stranded British Army soldiers to party with him one night. Did Reed ever engage in the homosex?

Speaking of fuckable, Lee Montgomery grew up to be a pretty handsome man.

R32, if he's your type, look for the nude wrestling scene in WOMEN IN LOVE.

But I suspect the weird noises were from a farting contest.

Dunsmuir House

Lee. Kinda of goofy looking from most angles but this 20 yo body was on point.