Screen to Scream: Crimson Peak and Mexican Gothic

There are so many haunted house stories out there, I wonder if, in these horror universes, there isn’t a subdivision of real estate that deals specifically with haunted homes (The realtor, smiling, says, “this house is located next to some great schools, the mall, and there’s a convenient Hellmouth in the basement”). That said, there are still people getting more mileage out of this trope, even doubling down into the trappings of Gothic storytelling: large, imposing mansion; odd, secretive characters that may or may not be antagonists, and bad weather (fog, rain, etc.). Guillermo Del Toro’s film Crimson Peak, for example, leans heavily into its Gothic roots, complete with that Del Toro aesthetic, but there are also books like Silvia Moreno-Garcia’sMexican Gothic that are willing to take the Gothic haunted house tale in new and exciting directions.

Crimson Peak is a visually breathtaking film, a literal Gothic tale come to life that can be genuinely scary. The story of Edith Cushing, a young woman who falls for an marries young eccentric Sir Thomas Sharp, is one familiar to many fans of the genre. All the basics are there, from an obtrusive, menacing sister who resents Edith’s presence to a notable physical location, the eponymous Crimson Peak, a mountain stained by its red clay (symbolism). Add a decrepit mansion with a hole in its center (MORE SYMBOLISM!) and you have all the ingredients there, but focused through the lens of Del Toro’s vision, such as his depictions of the ghosts that haunt this place, the movie becomes a sprawling, gorgeously odd movie.

Mexican Gothic is a different kind of story. Yes, there are the basic elements: slightly naïve but plucky heroine, sprawling family mansion that’s mostly isolated, creepy and off-putting family. However, Moreno-Garcia doesn’t rely on a visual aesthetic to draw readers in, instead using well-developed characters and descriptions to captivate readers. Noemi Taboada is more than just a heroine who finds herself suddenly over her head in a mansion far from her social circles. Noemi is a young woman with her own motivations and fears, one who realizes that her status as a woman and a socialite often has many of those she encounters pigeonholing her, even as she slowly discovers who she is and what she is truly capable of by delving into the mystery of High Place. High Place itself becomes more than just a house as Moreno-Garcia’s descriptions go beyond making High Place a metaphorical antagonistic setting and actually cast it as a living, even malevolent, organism. Both movie and book are familiar with the Gothic tradition, but they both find their emotional power by upending these traditions.