Revisit The house of the devil

House Of the Devil Is a good movie.

It’s a great movie in fact.

What’s so great about it?

When I was young there was a video store up the street from where Tiny lived named “Leicester Video” (It was in Leicester, ya see). On summer days or after school we would spend hours sitting in front of the giant TV in Tiny's basement (which I am still sure is one of the biggest TVs ever made), mesmerized by everything the L –video Horror section had to offer:

Waxwork
Sub Species
Near Dark
Freaks
Toxic Avenger
Dawn of the Dead
The Hills have Eyes
The Crazies
Evil Dead
Night of the Scarecrows
Return of the Living Dead

And so many more titles whose names are lost in my hazy Mountain Dew-drenched memories (due in no little part to the fact that so many of those VHS’s had 500 hundred different names and alternate releases).

Vestron…. Lighting Video…. Full Moon… Troma…. Like indie kids with recorded labels, these were our bibles; our harbingers of trash quality.



This little trip down memory lane is relevant for one reason.
You see….
As I was watching House of the Devil, I felt like I was re-watching one of those flicks.
I remembered taking the BIG BOX off the bottom shelf where the old forgotten gems lived. I clearly remembered walking down the winding parking lot of Larue’s grocery, staring at the black box with the P-Touched title, wondering if this weird looking movie was worth our 2 bucks - let alone 2 hours of our precious fall time. Wording what sort of forbidden gore - or better still, boobs – lie waiting, as Tiny inventoried our candy and soda purchase on the walk home.
I have clear visions of bad jokes and horrible puns we made during the film’s slow first 25 minutes.
I was left with a distinct memory of the uncomfortable laughter and awkward few minutes that filled the basement after all bloody hell broke lose.
And the following minute, when we would all start to slowly migrate toward the safeness of the couch as the eerie 70’s score and 80’s style cinematography caught us in it’s spooky web.
I remember it all…
except that it never happened.

TI West’s House of the Devil IS a perfect recreation of that experience. The set up is staggeringly simple:
Broke college wallflower Samantha (Jocelin Donahue) takes a babysitting job during a full lunar eclipse and ends up with way more than she bargains for, as her bizarre employers try to make her the centerpiece in there anti-Christ summoning ritual.
Tom Noonan will make your skin crawl off you body with his creepy spot-on performance; his “Tom” is awkward and pitiful, but powerful and frightening all at the same time.
Mary Wodrove makes you feel, well… just plain wrong. She looks like Cruella de Vil just crawled out of the grave after a losing battle with radiation poisoning. You fear her and hate her from the first second she hits she screen.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, Aj Bowing’s “Victor” is so mild-mannered you are not even afraid of him when he appears out of nowhere in a graveyard in the middle of the woods, until it’s to late. Then you are very afraid of his every sneaky movement.
Donahue’s Samantha makes every mistake and every boneheaded move that every dumb kid in every one of these flicks has ever made. She is completely unbelievable and complete perfect in this role.

This is not homage like Grind House or Devil’s Rejects.
It’s the real deal. Every note, every frame, is an 80’s VHS big box memory that never happened. Triggering false recollections of a better day - faded SP prints and gaudily painted box artwork.
I cannot recommend this nasty little flick enough. If you’re like me, it’s a road trip to a mom and pop video store that doesn’t exist anymore - but we so wish it did.