Red Room

A room where the boundaries between the living world and the afterlife dissolve completely.

The Red Room is a location within Hill House, a manor in western Massachusetts. Its plot follows a group of people who gather at Hill House for an apparent volunteer study on insomnia, only to find themselves plagued by paranormal events connected to the home's grim history.

Quick Facts

Location: Hill House
Primary inhabitants: Crain Family Spirits

Lore & Background

Hill House as having a grim history: its original owner, Hugh Crain, a 19th-century textile tycoon, constructed the home for his wife Renee. All of Crain's children were stillborns, and Renee, devastated by the multiple losses, killed herself, while Crain became a recluse. Nell later finds Crain's hidden study and learns that he extensively used child labor in his cotton mills, tortured and killed orphans in his home, then burned their bodies in the fireplace. She surmises that these children's spirits are trapped in the house, providing Crain with an 'eternal family'. Crain had a second wife named Carolyn, from whom Nell is descended.

Reader's Guide

The film's plot involves participants in an insomnia study at Hill House. Dr. Marrow's true purpose is to study the psychological response to fear, intending to expose his subjects to terror. The group tries to leave Hill House but Hugh Crain's ghost traps them inside. Nell realizes that Crain thrived on the fear he created in children and declares that she is not afraid of him, which weakens the ghost.