I took a class through @miskatonicinstitute earlier this year about Shirley Jackson and films that rely on the violent female characters that she loves to write. Instructor Bernice M. Murphy, an Irish Jackson scholar offered amazing examples of these women in books and film. But these two feel like they have the most connective tissue. She also has an introduction in the new book The Letters of Shirley Jackson, a collection of the writers letters.
We Have Always Lived in the Castle is one of my all time favorite books. It’s about two sisters isolated in their home due to the townspeople writing them off as witches because of a family tragedy years ago. There world is uprooted when Uncle Charlie comes to stay and life is forever changed. Mary is suspicious of his motives for coming to the house and will do whatever she can to protect the insolated world she and her sister have made.
In that same vein, Stoker from Korean director Park Chan-Wook introduces us to the Stoker family whose patriarch recently died. India is left alone with her mother when Uncle Charlie pays them a visit. Charlie takes an interest in India and clearly has some sort of hidden agenda. India is also suspicious of his motives.
Although Netflix made an adaptation of We Have Always Lived in the Caste, Stoker feels like the true spiritual adaptation with its characters, tone, and family drama. Both of the main characters have to deal with deaths in the family and must protect what they have left. They also feel like coming of age stories about two girls who must embrace their darker impulses to become women.
The Neon Banshee 