Catspaw
Kaneto Shindo's Kuroneko (Black Cat, 1968) is a horror film whose single most horrifying act occurs in the opening minutes.
A hut surrounded by a grove of great wavering bamboo; a band of men stepping out of the treeline to approach the hut. The men enter, see two women huddled by a fire. Their eyes meet; the men step forward.
Wait till your father gets
-- on the occasion of the film's 4k restoration
"(N)othing is so frightening as a labyrinth with no center" Jorge Luis Borges, quoting GK Chesterton*
Stanley Kubrick, reportedly dismayed by the poor boxoffice of Barry Lyndon, decided his next project would be a horror film; he skimmed through the opening pages of a stack of books (tossing aside those that failed to hold his attention) settled on Stephen King's The Shining, about a haunted hotel that turns an alcoholic father against his wife and telepathic son.
