CROWHAVEN FARM (1970)

Maggie Porter inherits some trinkets from her cousin Evelyn, while another cousin, Henry Pearson, inherits Crowhaven Farm, a nice bit of land in rural Massachusetts. But when Henry drives out one night to take possession of the farm, he sees a young blonde girl in the road; he swerves and hits a tree, and the car bursts into flames, killing him. The girl just smiles wickedly. Maggie, now the owner of the farm, moves there with her husband Ben, hoping perhaps that they can put some tensions behind them. He's a struggling artist and the two have just about given up on having a child, something Maggie really wants. They are accepted quickly by the townspeople who include the sexy Claire, the handsome Kevin, a doctor, and an oldtimer named Harold who gives Maggie a bunch of books about the history of the town, Brompton, which includes a period in the 1700s of witch fever when several women were executed. Strange things begin happening. Maggie feels like she's been in the house before, as she knows exactly where some secret panels and passages are. An old handyman keeps popping up in the house at odd times. Maggie has dreams of people in Puritan clothing pressing a witch to death under heavy stones, and hears the cry of a girl in the night. Things look up a bit when Kevin gets Maggie a secretarial job in Boston at a law firm, but Ben immediately gets jealous, even though Maggie doesn't actually work with him. Soon, a neighbor named Mercy Lewis who is dying of cancer asks Maggie to unofficially adopt her 10-year-old niece Jennifer (who looks like the strange girl that Henry saw just before his death). After leaving Jennifer for a trial stay with the Porters, Mercy kills herself and Maggie and Ben keep the girl. One night, Maggie stays at Kevin's apartment in the city because the roads are flooded; even though Kevin wasn't present, Maggie lies and tells Ben she stayed in a hotel. Ben's artistic career begins to pick up. Then, at a New Year’s Eve party, after Kevin kisses Maggie and Ben kisses Claire, Maggie breaks the news that she's finally pregnant. 

That is a lot of plot for a 75-minute TV movie, and we're only about halfway through when the supernatural element, present around the edges, kicks in. Old Harold dies in a fall, and when Maggie finally starts reading his history books, she discovers that one of the accused witches from the past was named Meg, was considered barren, suddenly conceived a child—it was assumed with Satanic help—and was tortured by stone pressing into betraying other witches in the community. Maggie sees parallels with her own life (her maiden name, Carey, is the same as Meg's). When Maggie goes to a stone quarry on the property that was rumored to have been used for coven meetings, she has a vision of a blood sacrifice being made by folks in Puritan clothing, and finds fresh blood on the stone altar. She gives birth prematurely to a healthy son, but when Ben finds out (from Jennifer) that Maggie spent a night at Kevin's apartment a few months before, things begin falling apart quickly and the movie rushes to an ending that is a bit predictable if you think of Rosemary's Baby—a Satanic pregnancy—and Thomas Tryon's novel Harvest Home—rural witchcraft. Still, it's satisfying with a nice hint of ambiguity at the very end.

As I've noted before, the 1970s was a golden age for TV movies, and the horror genre in particular, especially films centering on devil worship or witchcraft. This is one of the best-known examples. Stylistically, it's a bit clunky in the low-budget way of TV movies, but the plot and acting help lift this. Hope Lange is very good as Maggie, keeping us wondering, for a while at least, whether all this witchery is real or imaginary. She was nominated for an Oscar for the film of PEYTON PLACE but was perhaps best known as Mrs. Muir in the TV series version of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir; she also played Laura Dern's mother in BLUE VELVET. Paul Burke (VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, TV's Dynasty) is equally good as Ben, the nice-guy husband who is eventually driven to a horrific act. There is a large supporting cast with most members limited to fairly small amounts of screen time. Lloyd Bochner (Kevin), Virginia Gregg (Mercy), Cyril Delavanti (Harold), and Milton Selzer (the doctor) are standouts. John Carradine is the handyman who has very little to do except look creepy. 12-year-old Cindy Eilbacher is very good at being both innocent and sinister as Jennifer. One unusual scene that makes current-day viewers uncomfortable has Jennifer crawling into bed with Ben on the night that Maggie stays at Kevin's. Eilbacher has to look almost flirtatious and Burke has to look oblivious to her possible intention, accepting casually that she's just rattled by a storm, and due to them, I think the scene works—there's an unsavory frisson present but it doesn't get vulgar or queasy. There is no gore and only a splash of blood, and much of it is set in broad daylight, but the mood of evil is built carefully and sustained well. I rather like the McCarthyish twist of Meg being punished for naming names. For fans of 70s TV-movies, this is a must-see. Pictured at right are Burke and Lange; at the top, a shot of a coven meeting. [YouTube]