Joaquim da Silva Fontes, Significação e Estabilidade do Género no ...

here increased by the unsteady black-and-white visuals. The emotion of manipulation that
Gothic novels produced in the reader was now transferred to the screen, and the techniques
used augment the immediacy of dramatic events and the impending doom of the main
character.
The film gained much reputation because of this subtle mastery, its high production
values, but also because of its powerful casting, namely that of Ethel Barrymore, “the first
lady of the American stage” as the family matriarch. Awarded best supporting actress for
her performance as ailing Mrs. Warren, her character spends most of the film in bed as an
invalid matriarch but who nevertheless skilfully depicts her character’s sense of mounting
terror (fig. 82). In turn, the role young Helen plays as a live-in companion to the wealthy
lady is also a very good performance, especially taking into account that she is voiceless.
Figure 82. The Spiral Staircase
Finally, from the perspective of photography, the ideas of The Spiral Staircase are
rendered through many expressionist cinematographic techniques. By using deep-focus,
Siodmak and cinematographer Musuraca not only manage to create this sense of a
disturbed self for Albert Warren (George Brent) but the various layered sets that contain
foregrounds and backgrounds also provide a context of psychological damage for the other
members of the Warren family too. The deep focus technique is able to express the
complex, secluded space that the Warrens inhabit. The claustrophobic enclosure of the
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