Description

The Fall of the House of Usher (1928 in film) is a short film silent film horror film adaptation of the short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allan Poe. It tells the story of a brother and sister who live under a family curse. The actors are Herbert Stern, Hildegarde Watson, and Melville Webber.
The movie was directed by James Sibley Watson and Melville Webber. A music score was written in 1959 for the film by Watson and Webber’s friend, composer Alec Wilder.

Production

An avant-garde experimental film, the visual element predominates, including shots through prisms to create optical distortion. There is no dialogue, though one part features letters moving across the screen.

Influence

In 2000, the United States Library of Congress deemed the film a “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant film” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.