History Main / OldDarkHouse

* The board game ''TabletopGame/{{Clue}}'' (aka ''Cluedo'') is a best known example.

* ''13 Dead End Drive'' is a board game with this as the set piece and the players as potential heirs trying to bump each other off.

You know that old, foreboding house up on the top of the hill, surrounded by thick forests, and [[ClosedCircle accessible only by a single bridge that has a tendency to wash out during every rainstorm]]? Yeah, that one. Have you ever noticed that it always seems to attract eclectic groups of strangers who get invited for the reading of a will or a dinner party with a mysterious host? And why is it that the strangers keep [[TenLittleMurderVictims getting killed off, one by one]], during the night? It must be one of them doing it? But which?

* The board game ''TabletopGame/{{Clue}}'' (aka ''[[TabletopGame/{{Clue}} Cluedo]]'') is perhaps the best known example of this trope.

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** [[Film/HouseOnHauntedHill1999 The 1999 remake]] is more of a traditional HauntedHouse.

* The original ''Film/{{House On Haunted Hill|1959}}'' is a modernized version of one, using a Frank Lloyd Wright house, built in 1923, for exterior shots of the eponymous location (although the interior looks more typically 19th Century). Some very clever camera work makes it look like it's located in some desolate hill country, rather than the winding, dense LA neighbourhood of Los Feliz, where [[the house]] is in real life.

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* ''Ride/TheHauntedMansion'' at Disneyland was originally going to be this trope, but the concept was vetoed early on by Creator/WaltDisney who claimed that an abandoned, run-down mansion would look out-of-place on the main road of the otherwise pristine New Orleans Square. The future incarnations of the attraction (such as in Florida and Paris) end up playing this trope straight by having their mansions off of the main road and in their own mini-areas.

* Larry Blamire's ''Film/DarkAndStormyNight'' is an intentional AffectionateParody of this genre with a couple of LampshadeHanging moments.

* The original ''Film/{{House On Haunted Hill|1959}}'' is a modernized version of one (the house is a Creator/FrankLloydWright creation from 1923). [[Film/HouseOnHauntedHill1999 The 1999 remake]] is more of a traditional HauntedHouse.

* This is played with on a episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', Homer's Aunt has passed away, and her will demands that the Simpson family must spend a night in an allegedly haunted house. Cut to the family entering the house, Homer declaring "There's no such thing as ghosts." The next morning, the family is well-rested, refreshed, having slept better and the water was better too.

* Carfax Abby in ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'' serves as the 19th century equivalent of Dracula's castle when he makes his way to London. He ''specifically'' brought it because it was dark and forboding despite Harker being confused why he would want a building that's so run down. Also because it's big enough to hold his coffins of dirt and being close to London to hunt for blood.

-->'''Lawyer:''' ''(reading Will)'' To my nephew, Bender, I leave my castle...\\
'''Bender:''' Woohoo! Let's stay there tonight!\\
'''Lawyer:''' ...on the condition that he stay there tonight.\\
'''Bender:''' Ah crap! There's always a catch...

* An old Creator/BelaLugosi movie called ''Film/Ghost Story'' took place in such a mansion. Though since the movie was primarily meant to be humorous, there was no murder involved.

* The Creator/AbbottAndCostello movie ''Film/Hold That Ghost'' takes place in an old abandoned inn that the boys inherited from a dying gangster.

* An old theatre serves this purpose in ''Film/The Last Warning''. It was closed years ago due to a scandalous murder that went unsolved, and now it's about to be reopened with the same people that were working in it during the incident. The whole thing is actually a set-up to finally catch the culprit.

* The movie ''Film/TheOldDarkHouse1932'' (as well as [[Film/TheOldDarkHouse1963 the 1963 remake]]) is the TropeNamer. In the former, group of characters get stuck on a stormy night in a house with dark history. The latter is a comedy murder mystery concerning a family fortune.
** Both movies are based on an old novel, ''Benighted'', by J.B. Priestly.
* ''Film/TheMonster'' (1925) might be the earliest example of this trope. The mansion/asylum currently occupied by Dr. Ziska has hidden passageways, hidden trap doors, steel shutters that slide down in front of the windows to prevent escape, and fireplaces rigged to emit knockout gas. And of course it's got Ziska's creepy lab down in the basement.

* An old Creator/BelaLugosi movie called ''Ghost Story'' took place in such a mansion. Though since the movie was primarily meant to be humorous, there was no murder involved.
* The Don Knotts film ''Film/ThePrivateEyes'' featured one of these where the house staff are being knocked off one by one some time after the the lord and lady are murdered.
* ''Film/MurderByDeath'' is one of these movies, only the guests are all pastiches of famous fictional detectives.
* Even though it takes place in a radio station during a live show, ''Film/TheRadiolandMurders'' plays this trope pretty well. The biggest difference is that only certain important people conected to the station are in danger, and not everyone in the building.

* Xanadu is often presented this way in ''Film/CitizenKane''.
* The Creator/AbbottAndCostello movie ''Hold That Ghost'' takes place in an old abandoned inn that the boys inherited from a dying gangster.
* An old theatre serves this purpose in ''The Last Warning''. It was closed years ago due to a scandalous murder that went unsolved, and now it's about to be reopened with the same people that were working in it during the incident. The whole thing is actually a set-up to finally catch the culprit.
* Most of ''Film/WhatACarveUp'' takes place in Blackshaw Towers; a creepy old mansion of the Yorkshire moors. It becomes even creepier when the killer sabotages the power plant, plunging the house into darkness.
* In ''Film/TheGhoul'', Professor Morlant lives in a rambling old mansion on the Yorkshire Moors, lit entirely by candles.
* A variant of this in the neo-noir ''Film/BadTimesAtTheElRoyale''. Instead of a crumbling Victorian mansion it's a flashy Art Deco motel, but a lot of the hallmarks of the genre - an eclectic cast of characters bearing shocking secrets, [[ClosedCircle trapped together]] - are all there.

* The Hollister house in ''Film/DeadBirds'' is a sprawling abandoned farmhouse in the middle of dead cornfield, and the scene of unspeakble evil that has forever tainted the property. Perhaps not the best place to hide out and divide the loot after a bank robbery.
* In ''Film/{{Husk}}'', a car crash leaves the protagonists [[LostInTheMaize stranded in a cornfield]]. After discovering [[CellPhonesAreuseless their cell phones don't work]], they decided to make their way to a creepy, seemingly abandoned farmhouse located in the centre of the cornfield to see if they can phone for help. [[TemptingFate What could possibly go wrong]]?

* The mansion in "The Cold, Stark House", another work by Creator/KimNewman, and basically ''The Old Dark House'' films relocated to the ''TabletopGame/WarhammerFantasy'' universe.

* In ''Film/{{Husk}}, a car crash leaves the protagonists [[LostInTheMaize stranded in a cornfield]]. After discovering [[CellPhonesAreuseless their cell phones don't work]], they decided to make their way to a creepy, seemingly abandoned farmhouse located in the centre of the cornfield to see if they can phone for help. [[TemptingFate What could possibly go wrong]]?

* The best ''VideoGame/NancyDrew'' games [[TropesAreNotBad often take place in one of these.]] In particular, Blackmoor Manor and Thornton Hall are excellent examples of the trope.

Expect many [[SecretPath passageways hidden]] [[BookcasePassage behind bookcases]], usually operated [[ShaggySearchTechnique by candlesticks]], [[PortraitPaintingPeephole portraits with removable eyes for spying]], and the ubiquitous [[DramaticThunder thunder and lightning]]. Almost inevitably, all methods of communication with the outside world will have [[ClosedCircle somehow ceased to function]], if they ever existed at all... especially [[CutPhoneLines telephones]]. (This was more plausible in the early 20th century, a.k.a. [[GenteelInterbellumSetting Agatha Christie Time]], when many old dwellings had not yet been fitted with telephones and service in general was commonly more apt to fail.) You can also expect the lights to go out several times during the night. (Usually [[LightsOffSomebodyDies when it's least convenient]].)