[31 Days of Halloween 2015: THE HOUSES OCTOBER BUILT
is now available on
DVD, Blu Ray, On Demand, and Netflix Instant.]
Review by Bob Ignizio
*Note: As with last year’s 31 Days of Halloween marathon of
horror movie reviews, we’ll be diving deep into the new release section looking
for modern horror fare, hoping for the best, but frankly expecting the worst.*
For better but usually worse, the found footage/faux
documentary horror genre is here to stay. And while one of the year’s best
films, WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS,
makes a strong case for the genre’s survival, films like THE HOUSES OCTOBER BUILT present an equally compelling argument for
its speedy demise. Of course seeing as these films are so cheap and seemingly
easy to make, that’s probably not going to happen. But I digress. On with the
film at hand.
The premise of HOUSES
is that a group of friends are making a documentary on the most extreme haunted
attractions in America. An actual documentary on that subject sounds like a
good idea, but we only get snippets of anything resembling that. Instead this
is mostly the same old found footage formula where we spend an almost agonizing
amount of time with the main characters – Zack (Zack Andres), Brandy (Brandy
Schaefer), Bobby (Bobby Roe), Mikey (Mikey Roe), and Jeff (Jeff Larson) – as
they walk through various haunted attractions and grumble about not finding the
truly terrifying one they’ve been seeking. Eventually the group gets a lead on
an underground haunt called The Blue Skeleton, but it may turn out to be more
than they bargained for.
To be sure, there are some effective scares in the film, but
overall it was a tough slog getting through the whole thing. As is often the
case in these found footage films, the characters don’t come across as particularly
interesting, and at times are even grating. Plus it’s just hard to understand
why they’d keep going even as it’s obvious that things are getting a little
hairier than they had expected. Eventually HOUSE
becomes just another movie where you feel like whatever horrible fate is in
store for our protagonists, they kind of deserve it. 2 out of 4 stars.
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