House

Occasionally I find movies that I want to watch based on their descriptions through netflix. Either they were suggested to me because of some rating I gave to a different movie, or the same actors appear or whatever. So I read the little paragraph description about the movie and see if it peaks my interest. I of course always forget that these little descriptions are written by someone that was paid to say nice and interesting things about the movie.

That leads us to House. What was presented to me as a horror movie about a serial killer that lures people to his "house" and then leaves them rules about how to survive his game, I was mildly intrigued. It isn't material that hasn't been covered before, but it sets the stage for an entertaining premise. Throw in the fact that the serial killer, known as the Tin Man because he leaves his rules written on a tin can for the people to find, was to be played by Michael Madsen. That dude can play a creepy, psychopathic killer. So I figured this is going to be awesome.

The beginning plays out like many other horror movies before it. Couple is traveling to some destination. They are bickering and generally don't get along. There is mention of going to couples counselling. This all sets up their story that they will not get along in a high pressure environment well. They quickly run into one of the most used horror movie problems, car trouble, and make their way to seek shelter and find a phone in a secluded bed and breakfast. So far I'm with the movie.

They get to the old Victorian mansion and find that there is a second couple that also had car trouble investigating the house. They find no sign of any workers or other people at the house, and continue to explore. There are some creepy creeks and groans of the spooky house, and some quick cuts of a child laughing and giggling in the dark. Again, nothing new here, but it was setting a mood quite effectively. Still with it.

Shortly there after the house owners show up and are creepy as hell. The old woman that runs the place is very creepy. She has one son who becomes fixated with one of the women and wants to marry her right away. He gave off the creepy inbred retarded vibe, again not new in horror movies, but was done effectively. There's a second brother who's introduced who is gruff and evil. All three of these new characters were really starting to creep me out, and I had high hopes for what was to come, because I knew I was still waiting for The Tin Man to show up, and I thought there was going to be some awesome stuff coming.

But oh how wrong I was. I started noticing some oddly placed lines in the script. Instead of talking about how sleeping together was dirty, it was referred to as a sin. There were multiple instances of the word sin, as in "guilty as sin, heavy as sin, sinners, etc..." I started to get a bad feeling in my head. This couldn't possibly be some kind of christian propaganda movie thinly veiled in a horror movie could it? Michael Madsen will save the day, I just know it.

Of course I was wrong.

The rest of the film, until the very end, you just see The Tin Man in shadows stalking people around with a stupid mask on. The four people that were lead to the house are all revealed to have some horrible secret. The one couple both killed someone that was abusing them, and the second couple didn't pay attention to their daughter and she ended up drowning. These flashbacks are done to give you the impression of the abuse, but not really show it. BUT, the people feel bad about killing their abusers. Because it was a SIN.

The movie held so much promise for about 30 minutes, then delved fully into some dumb ass christian allegory for the next hour, culminating in them finding the "good" sister who was shunned in the basement. Her good "light" will destroy all the evil in the house, but only if they believed in her and rejected what the "evil" Tin Man was saying. What started out as just a mild christian indoctrination became such a farce that one could not help but draw the conclusions they wanted you to make. Granted anyone watching this movie that knew it was based in Christian Theology would already be "saved" and not need to watch the movie, and any gore hound like myself is going to watch it thinking awesome shit is about to go down, and then just groan and hate everything about the movie. Way to go asshats.

I will say one thing. The first thirty minutes are awesome. If you take that and then added on another hour of what should have come, and this movie would have rocked. It was shot well though. Visually it looked good. Though that's seldom enough to make a movie worth watching.

Why God, Why???

P.S. And for those wondering, this was movie 98 for the year. I'm going to have to buckle down if I'm going to hit my goal of 120. Wish me luck.