There are few movies out there of a mystery-fantasy genre that do not, at the core of their theme, highlight many of the features that the Georgians would have found in their very own homes as a part of its' ordinary structure.
Picture the stone steps leading underground to Pan's Labyrinth, the door long forgotten and shrouded in overgrowth opening into The Secret Garden or falling through the back of a wardrobe into a parallel world nothing like our own. In many peoples childhood, it is easily The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe and similar magical mysteries that inspired you to explore. To wander down long dark corridors or rummage through wardrobes, chests and attic rooms in grandparents houses in the hope of finding something.... magical.
Now imagine growing up in a Georgian townhouse or country house with its' basements below, accessed by steps often painted in black to indicate that you shouldn't go down unless you belonged there. The doorways hidden in plain sight, seamless, frame-less and wallpapered or painted to perfectly disappear into its' surroundings. Or the garden walls with heavy solid doorways probably leading to kitchen gardens originally but now sewn firmly shut by overgrowth. These elements of design were not installed just to intrigue visitors and excite the imagination. This was real life functional architecture of the day, designed not just to be practical, but to house and hide an entire underground nation; the servants.
So not only do you see the tantalizing top steps of a mysterious and dimly lit passage downwards, but you may hear the dampened voice of a being you will never know the face of. You may hear a distant muffed clattering or banging of maids and cooks at work below ground. Then how about the second, or indeed third, hidden stairwells winding upwards throughout the many levels of the house? The footsteps on stone in the dark hours of the morning, ringing throughout your half-asleep half-awake state. Is it real, is it a dream or is it supernatural? And is that the faint outline of a secret door frame you see hidden in your bedroom bookcase, that those footsteps are approaching? No wonder so many old houses hold a claim to the metaphysical.
And how wonderful that is. To be sure of your surroundings has a certain comfort. But to know that there is nothing certain at all, that your surroundings might surprise or trick you, is a marvelous reminder that buildings, the world and life itself may hold just a little bit more than meets the naked eye. Be that a comfort or a concern, we can certainly all agree, it is... more.