1 Good, 1 Bad House Horrors

 

1 Good, 1 Bad House Horrors

by Kristin Battestella

For every good house horror movie, there are certainly bad house horrors! Here is an exercise in what one haunt does wrong for its women in peril – and what another gets right about feminine horrors.

Skip It!

Treehouse – An infamous chef retreats to his estranged family's vacation home in this 2019 Hulu/Blumhouse Into The Dark entry. Our gourmet is angry at the wannabe chefs on his cooking show, and he can't give his undivided attention to his young daughter – sending her off with an assistant on the weekend of his ex-wife's remarriage. Oversharing dialogue, cars full of chicks, hip music, and creepy convenience store stops pile on the horror cliches alongside unnecessary pop culture platitudes that get old very fast. Every introduction is awkward and each sentence is littered with a tiresome joke or attempted cool reference in this frustrating script. The old family maid at their grand villa says it's the things she can't unsee that keep her up at night, but weird portraits of his father looming over the bedroom, bugs in the kitchen, and bloody gunk in the toilet don't amount to anything. Our chef thinks he is too cool for school, we get it, and helping the ladies next door with flashlights and candles after their generator fails leads to his offering to cook dinner for their bachelorette party. The women, however, are also obnoxious – rude, sassy, diverse yet checking every stereotype amid the self-referential Hulu quips and acoustic ballads by the fire pit. Lilith names, conversations about birth, and Celtic sister tattoos contrast his drunken foot in the mouth flirtations. Unfortunately, statements on women not having a voice and being forced to live with the terrible things that happen to them come off terribly tone deaf before for the sake of it weirdness, peacocks, distorted angles, mirrors, red flashes, and creepy tongues. The overgrown spooky and titular echoes are never used to full advantage despite twig effigies, freaky wooden masks, and a wild mushroom lady knocking at the door. Rather than playing sarcastic and coy, this should have gotten to the horror much sooner, but alas, paralysis and bound to the bed fears leads to bloody lips and ladies in lingerie because our sleazy cook still finds the seemingly evil women “would do” hot. They each re-enacted his past harassments with pentagrams, spells, nail clippings, snakes, and voodoo contortions. Of course, he thinks he can talk his way out of their revenge – taking pot shots with self-esteem insults, insisting a woman's suicide was not his fault, disbelieving his inferior position, and cracking jokes until the crossbows are aimed at his crotch. Escape attempts, aimless twists, family connections, and obvious secrets should be better than this rushed first draft lip service, and it all comes off as girl power turned nasty bully bitches as written by a man. It's such an elaborate set up for what isn't a surprise, and the lesson should have been from the women's point of view. He continues making excuses that there are two sides to every flirtation and he was a drunk teenager so the word “rape” doesn't apply. Instead of provocative commentary, this distasteful, erroneous, hollow, flat perspective misses the point entirely.

Well Done!

The Night House – A drifting boat, swaying wind chimes, as is rooms, and friends offering help left on the doorstep greet widow Rebecca Hall (The Awakening) in this 2020 study on deception and grief. The custom built, isolated lake house reiterates the home alone emptiness, wine, sad songs, chairs for two, and his bare side of the bed before alarm clocks, coffee, and other teachers whispering at school. The dialogue comes naturally – no one would blame her for taking time off, she's not sleeping well, she should get away from the house that her husband built. Beth is frank with a pissy parent, for her husband shot himself in the head so what do grades matter? The radio playing by itself, knocks at the door with no one there, unlocked gates, and muddy footprints create ominous as happy construction videos contrast the loneliness. These home videos aren't found footage for the viewer but Beth watching, crying, and packing away her husband's things. His journals are full of intriguing design configurations, reverse floor plans, symbols, and notes to trick it with puzzles and decoys but not trust it. The character focused horror drama comes in the uncomfortable conversational backstory – teenage Beth was dead for four minutes after car accident and only her husband knew she saw nothing but an empty tunnel. She was the depressing one but now she keeps his nonsensical suicide note in her purse while the sleep paralysis, sleepwalking, nightmares, and ghosts escalate. Rather than repeated scares going round and round for the audience, Beth uncovers evidence of more secrets. Chiming texts apparently from her husband are disturbing enough, but she dials his cell and someone answers. Her agitated, on edge frazzled increases thanks to distorted voices, duplicate images, other women seemingly in the house, and seeing herself sleeping on the sofa. The zigzagging dock stairs lead to bloody boats, red smoke across the lake, caressing winds, and swooning levitation in well done hazy transitions. Flashlight beams reveal women running in the dark, abandoned buildings in the woods, tarps, unfinished construction, and effigies. Bookstore clues and relatable confrontations only lead to more questions as the wronged Mrs. gets carried away in the false floors and gory discoveries. Creaking noises, clutter, and altered house perspectives force us to pay attention and see what may be there. The camera accentuates duality with twofer shots, lookalikes, and similar dreams, and the happy memories disappear once we realize our husband and wife didn't know each other as well as they thought. Friends tell Beth to leave the house, move on with her life and not fall into dark despair, but she mocks the idea before sobbing on the shower floor. The hard bitch solving the mystery attitude drops as the grief finally come forth. Ghostly writings, mirrors, reverse reflections, eerie voices, and distorted visuals accent spooky encounters, visions of past violence, and creepy maze-like attacks. Invisible whooshes and fights with oneself in the last half hour are a little odd. Some metaphors are obvious yet others are unclear and questions on who did what and why remain. However the Final Destination maturity doesn't overstay its welcome. My husband saw this before me, and he says seeing it a second time explains everything. Rather than in your face horror typical; crescendos, editing, and neon lighting punctuate the body contortions, multi level purgatory planes, and dual culmination.