I have vague memories of once watching a black and white film with a strange but interesting premise. Basically due to some unknown factor (but hinted to be psychological group hysteria) the participants in a party at a house find themselves unable to leave the building. There’s no obvious reason why they can’t but they just can’t bring themselves to do so, but more oddly no-one on the outside can bring themselves to enter it either.
If I recall correctly the spell is finally broken when a small boy runs into the building, apparently unaffected by whatever was bothering the adults.
I believe I know the movie and I’ve spent 20 minutes trying to remember its name. I saw it in college in 1961 and it was only a few years old at the time. I think it was a Spanish picture, although it might have been French. I’m still looking through my movie books trying to identify it.
There’s a Twilight Zone where a guy tricks people into hiding in a bomb shelter, making them all believe they can’t leave. Could that be what you are thinking of?
I’m pretty sure this is the right answer. I too saw this film in college (mid-90’s), and it has come to mind every now and then, but I could never remember the name.
Being in Spanish really made it difficult for me to follow. It wasn’t subtitled, and honestly, I don’t even remember what were the circumstances that had me stuck watching the damn thing. I do remember that for some reason, everybody was suddenly able to leave the house; then they switched the scene to a church, where a Mass was just ending.
The film is one of director Luis Bunuel’s rather cynical parody of the bourgeiosie class. The underlining idea of the film is that the wealthy class citizens (who become trapped at the party) are prisoners of a rigid system of manners. What happens in the film is that the hostess of the party yawns, or looks tired. The host asks is she would like to retire, and she glibly says something like “No, I’m having too much fun! I never want this night to end.” That acts like a magical spell, since by their rigid mores it would be improper for a guest to leave if the hostess still wanted the keep the party going (whether or not they really wanted to stay.) The party goers escape their predicament when (after several days of wandering aimlessly around the same room), the hostess realizes they are all in the same position they were in when the spell began. She gets her husband to repeat his question “Would you like to retire?” and she says “Yes! Let’s all retire!” At which point, they are all free to leave.
The final scene, showing the same spell occur at the church suggests that the Catholic church was so mired in ritual and ways of behaving that it’s members would never escape its’ imprisonment.
Believe it or not, the Catholic church was so offended by the criticism that it tried to have all copies of the film negatives destroyed! Director Bunuel himself was dis-satisfied with the final film, but for the opposite reason - he didn’t feel he was scathing enough. In his memoir, he said that he would have liked to have had a scene depicting the starving guests resort to cannibalism.
