Here is a movie I have not watched in many years but was kind of a favorite when I was, what, 13-15 years old. I revisited it as an adult and I remember thinking it wasn't bad but kinda came up short. I decided, just randomly, to revisit again the other night. Mostly I enjoyed it but it has a few shortcomings.
How would I describe this movie?
Well, plot-wise, it's the story of a famous author whose aunt unexpectedly commits suicide and leaves him, her favorite nephew, her house. Which she steadfastly believed was haunted. He is recently divorced and still reeling from the event that destroyed his marriage, the disappearance of their son. He still has traumatic memories from his time in Vietnam and he decides to move into the house and try to write them out as his next book.
It starts out with a nice opening scare that caught me off guard and put me in a charitable mood. I definitely dug that and it made me say to myself, "I’m planning to be generous to this movie." Which is a great place to watch a movie from. Acknowledge the bad but enjoy the good and let things slide you don't have to get in a twist over.
And, fortunately, this movie really has a sense of humor. And I don’t mean like it’s funny like a comedy, I mean the movie has a sense of humor. Not just about itself, which is also true, but in general.
I would say that it's little bit like if
Killer Klowns From Outer Space met
Evil Dead 2.
And this becomes more apparent when Roger has his first encounter with the House...
There were a number of things I liked about the film. It had a sense of humor, for sure, but it also actually made me feel something with the disappearance of the child. And then it got a little edgy too, for a light goof of a film, in a little bit of that
Evil Dead way. And then George Wendt, Norm from Cheers, comes in right on time to add something. Which he did.
“Don’t worry about anything, I guess. I’ll just be sure to give you a call if something bad happens.”
Susan French, in her brief role as Aunt Elizabeth, was almost too good for this movie. She certainly acting as if she was in a much more serious film. Or she was just "game" as they say. I particularly enjoyed when her ghost tells the protagonist, “The House tricked me Roger. I didn’t think it could but it did. It’ll trick you too.”
The pacing of this movie is actually pretty good as well. Things happen on frequent enough beats to make you feel like you keep moving and you’re never bogged down, whether you think the movie is any good or not. And even when it delves too far into silliness it seems to find a way to recover.
There’s also this interesting game going on in the background, which you know is not remotely gonna be the outcome but they still play on it a bit, which is that the House may not be haunted, this whole thing could just be this Vietnam vet whose son was kidnapped finally losing his mind.
And then he ****ing shoots his ex-wife! Did the House trick him like it tricked Aunt Elizabeth? Or did he just murder the mother of his missing son?
I did get reminded before long though, that the thing I didn’t like about this movie when I re-watched it as an adult was the Vietnam stuff. It really looks bad. Cheaply done, maybe it's supposed to look like a dream or something but they should have done better. And they really focus on it a good bit. I mean, the movie, in its sense of humor, actually has one of the characters say, “Nobody wants to hear about Vietnam anymore”, and then, winkingly proceeds to not take its own advance and has a whole thing about Vietnam. Unfortunately, it probably should have taken its own advice.
While this guy might have
looked cool...
His whole part in the story really didn't work and kinda dragged the whole film down.
And the climax is a bit of a letdown, not only because it leans hard into the not-working-so-great Vietnam business, but it kinda confounds whatever explanation for the whole story there might have been and makes for a confusing and unsatisfying end. One wonders if there was a different movie with a more sensible and satisfying ending on the cutting-room floor.
Ultimately, I'm not at all irritated that I spent the slot to watch it, it's definitely worth seeing and has a fun, "we're gonna try to make a little bit more mainstream Evil Dead-type movie" but, honestly, it doesn't fully deliver on the promise that it clearly has.
Now
House II... that's another story.
Reply to Topic
Check out my podcast: