That does it! I'm gonna fuckin' kill you all!
[img]graemlins/hmmm.gif[/img] I'm sorry, was I a little short? [img]wink.gif[/img]
...yes, it is time once again for another installment of Messterpiece Theatre. I am your host, Sir Dark Angel Oversexedupton. Today, we will examine a film titled "The Legend Of Hell House."
An interesting film, both lauded and maligned, and one can see why from the outset: A wealthy old man, crippled, dying, hires a group of psychic investigators to examine the former home of one Emeric Belasco, now known as (wait for it)...Hell House. Charming moniker. In exchange for their determining whether or not there is life after death, he will pay each of them $100,000.
Sound familiar? That's because it appears, for all practical purposes, to be a mix of "The House on Haunted Hill" and "The Haunting". Of course, in the original "House on Haunted Hill", the party-goers were offered $10,000 each; in the 90's remake, it was upped to one million. That's inflation for you.
Still, it is a horror film, and the horror genre as a whole is known for borrowing liberally from its own history. No problems there. The merry group is formed, consisting of a scientist of some kind, a medium of the physical sort, another medium of the spiritual sort, and the scientist's wife. Together, they hire a boat to take them on a three hour tour, a three hour tour, which leads inexorably...
...oopsy, wrong story.
They go to Hell House, and begin doing their spiritual investigation thingy. There's some talk about how horribly evil Belasco was, some channeling occurs, some fine china gets broken, Belasco's sheer meanness is discussed, the humans begin turning against one another, we are reminded again of how truly evil Belasco was, Roddy McDowall refuses the creepy yet still genuinely arousing demonic come-ons of Gayle Hunnicut, Pamela Franklin gets mad at everyone, reminds them of how wicked Belasco was, gets attacked by what appears to be a stuffed cat, and eventually invites a ghostly entity into her bed in order to help him "move on".
Yes, you read that right.
She fucked a ghost.
Also, they reinforce the utter malignency that was Belasco.
Yeah, you figure that one out.
In any case, there are a few genuinely creepy moments, and the film begins wrapping up and killing off the most obnoxious characters before they start to annoy the audience too much, although one of them manages to refer to Belasco and his incredible devilry one last time before dying. Under a large crucifix, no less. So far, good enough, insofar as a haunted house film is concerned, but it is the mind-numbingly absurd finale that makes this "House" of cards fall down.
(Did you like that? I really wanted to work that one in here.)
So, why all the fuss? All the "evil"? All the dying and melodrama? Simple as can be, my children, but I shall give *SPOILER* warnings, because I feel that all new viewers of this messterpiece should experience the stupidity of it all in much the same manner I did. So...
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*SPOILERS*
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...Belasco's evil stemmed from his being short.
Yes, you read that right: He was pissed off because he was short.
[img]graemlins/whatever.gif[/img]
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*End Spoilers*
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All in all, a decent film with a genuinely remarkable ending, although not in a good way.
Multiple thumbs in various revealing poses.
<font color="#cd6600" size="1">[ October 04, 2004 02:25 PM: Message edited by: -Dark Angel- ]</font>
That does it! I'm gonna fuckin' kill you all!
[img]graemlins/hmmm.gif[/img] I'm sorry, was I a little short? [img]wink.gif[/img]
sounds hot and kinky
Fluff: Possibly, but at least yer not being small about it. [img]wink.gif[/img]
I avoided the spoilers.... so if you answered this question in there, please don't kill me...
what year? How much?
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">'73, $5.50 at W-M, and I'll fucking well kill you if I damn well please, bucko!Originally posted by Joranthalus:
I avoided the spoilers.... so if you answered this question in there, please don't kill me...
what year? How much?
Also, email's on the fritz, hence my lack of communications to you.
damn... didn't see that one at WM here... i guess i gotta keep checking...
UUUUUUUUUUUU..........scary......... [img]tongue.gif[/img]
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