Director: Víctor García
Starring: Amanda Righetti, Cerina Vincent, Erik Palladino, Tom Riley, Jeffrey Combs
Tagline: None. House on Haunted Hill had "Evil Loves to Party" - I guess evil just doesn't party like it used to.
Random Trivia: Combs is the only returning actor from the first movie. This is Victor Garcia's first feature length English language movie. I'm baked. Erik Palladino is a former MTV Vee-Jay. That sounds way too much like...
There are a couple of signs that your movie may be considered for the straight to DVD, low budget fare:
A) Your movie is a sequel... and only one actor is returning.
B) Your movie is a sequel to a remake - and the remake wasn't very good.
C) That one returning actor? It's not the star from the first film. It's a supporting role. And the star has been killed off, off-screen, and even her ghost is being played by someone else.
With A, B, and C firmly secured, Return to House on Haunted Hill (I'd like to buy a T, H, and E, Pat) goes through the motions of recreating the ever-so-popular group of pretty twenty-somethings stuck alone overnight in a haunted house scenario. Oh, and the backyard has a bit of a drop.
This time out, though, it's about a group of them being forced into the place by a pack of gun-wielding mercenaries looking for an ancient relic. On the other side of things is lone returnee Jeffery Combs' Dr. Richard Vannacutt, who seeks this idol the way Indiana Jones seeks a relic - with good intentions, but no real forward planning, because "it belongs in a museum."
Combs, while I'm at it, is the only one who can really act, although new lead Amanda Righetti, who takes up the reigns as Ariel Wolfe, sister to Ali Larter's Sara Wolfe from the first movie, isn't too shabby either.
Let's set the stage:
Sara Wolfe has committed suicide, or so it would seem. Sister Ariel investigates, only to meet Dr. Vannacutt, who claims that Sarah had agreed to return to the house to help him seek the statue of Baphomet, an ancient relic Vannacutt has been seeking for years and that is believed to be the center of the House's power.
Only flaw - Erik Palladino as Desmond, former student of Dr. Vannacutt, who has hired a bunch of mercs, and has a mole inside Vannacutt's inner circle that alerts him to the location of the statue - putting him on the offensive, taking Vannacutt, Ariel, Vannacut's assistant, and Ariel's love interest Paul hostage within the house.
And, of course, they get locked in.
In case you don't remember, the reason the house is haunted - other than the statue - is that a creepy doctor once experimented on psychiatric patients there. How original.
Once again, like with Bitten, this film's main attempt to save itself is via hot bi-sexual girl on undead girl action. Which leads to:
Ugly undead rooting boobs.
And aside from that, it's just going through the motions. Palladino's Desmond never comes off as really badass, nor to most of the mercs. The ghost sequences just aren't scary, although one or two might be deemed creepy. Low on the jump scares - and here's a little rant: Jump scares are normally overused, but honestly, this movie really, really needs them. If the rest of the movie isn't scary, at least a couple jolts keeps the viewer on the edge of his seat, albeit for the wrong reasons.
Alas, there's almost no fun to be had here. I'm sitting watching the action unfold thinking "what the fuck" for about a third of the movie. Characters fall into the usual traps.
Oh, and the statue. Don't even get me started on why, when you shoot it, it won't budge, but you can pry it loose with your bare hands.
Logic. Gotta love it!
This pulls a 2 mostly because it's better than Hammer of the Gods and End of the Line, so I can't justify giving it a 1. That by no means is an endorsement. Unlike Ariel, do not go in.
Overall rating: 1/4 Baked (2 out of 5)
No comments:
Post a Comment