The House of The Devil Review

Last night, I had a miserable cough that kept me awake all night. My day job requires operations of very heavy machinery in an unstable environment, therefore, I had to call in, not something I normally do, but it's not worth the risk of being drowsy behind the wheel of a 40 ton truck. Still hacking and coughing, I thought I could use the extra time to watch a few movies I have been meaning to catch up on. One of which is called "The House of The Devil".

I'm not exactly sure what possessed me (gettit? lol) to watch this little film in which a college girl named Samantha (played wonderfully by newcomer Jocelin Donahue) is desperate to get her own house and takes an unusual babysitting job for a creepy older couple. Sounds like you've seen it before, right? In some ways, you have. The movie is smartly set in the 1980's era, which drowns out cell phones and other technology that bogs down suspense films of today, which is way cool. However, the film does have it's classic moments of horror-cliches (girl runs upstairs, not down, victims retardedly oblivious to they're surroundings, etc.), but at the same time, is self-aware of most of them. What the film-makers denied us in this 80's set movie was nudity! I'm no perv or what-not, but that was the norm for these types of films, and we got nothing. So, sorry, boys (and maybe some girls), no boobies in this one.

Now for those of you looking for demonic possession with gruesome gore, you'll get it. Just not soon. The writer/director, Ti West, really channeled his inner-Kubrick for this film, and it's nothing short of awesome. The film has an incredibly slow pace, with good intents and purposes. Building tension is hard to do in a film, and while West does a good job, you can't exactly cut it with a knife. You will be bored through most of these scenes, which involves Samantha roaming through the big house, ordering pizza, dancing to 80's music, and shrugging off strange noises. I'm warning you, while there are quick scenes of "action" spliced throughout all that, this movie takes an extremely long time to get going. I myself didn't mind though, I was enjoying watching how well the production was set up for an 80's style setting.

When it finally does get going, it's quick. Real quick. And loads of fun. What's most interesting (to me, anyways), is that there is no copious amounts nerve-wracking screaming. That shtick gets old, fast. Most horror/suspense movies pride themselves on having a "scream queen", which is cool for most horror fans, but 70 minutes of nails-on-chalkboard-screaming (ala, House of A 1,000 Corpses) is really annoying to me. Yes, they are scared, move on, seriously. The chase sequences and most of action is well done, leading up to an ending that was, in my humble opinion, smart, but unsatisfactory. West could've gone several directions with his ending, all of which I'm sure would've either been predictable or a major let-down. While he choose to give us a somewhat happy ending, he also choose not to answer many questions. While some people like that certain element of mystery, this movie, in my opinion, needed some questions answered. I can't say which ones without giving away spoilers, but if you watch this movie, you will no doubt agree, at least in part.

Bottom Line? I enjoyed this weird little creep-fest, and I'm seriously hoping it will hit Blu-Ray, as this movie just commands hi-def treatment. This would actually be a good date movie for guys who have girls who enjoy getting the creeps from a film. Go into it knowing that is a slow moving film, and you should be quite happy with it.