10 More Horror Movie Moments More Terrifying When You Know The Truth

The chances are, if this film has found its way onto your radar, you're likely aware of the unique promotional gimmick used to get folks into cinemas to watch it back in 1959.

If not, though, you're in for a treat. 

William Castle's House on Haunted Hill boasts a scene involving a skeleton rising out of a vat of acid. And in a few theatres, said moment was accompanied by a plastic skeleton that was rigged up to float around a cinema. 

It all seems quite silly - mostly because it is - but the truth behind the skeleton scene actually makes the sight of it creeping toward Carol Ohmart's Anabelle Loren way scarier.

You see, this skeleton being controlled by Vincent Price's Frederick Loren wasn't plastic like the ones used in theatres for the "Emergo" gimmick. Nope, this one was the real deal.

Craig Reardon, who worked as the special effects and makeup supervisor on Poltergeist (another movie that contains its own real skeletons), noted this during the Cursed Films show's episode on that film (via CBR). He explained, when discussing his annoyance at the fact many feel the Poltergeist movie was cursed because of the use of real human skeletons, that House on Haunted Hill had done that very same thing years earlier.

This was simply because it was cheaper than having a prop one made. And just like that, a quite goofy scene from the '50s suddenly feels a whole lot more frightening.