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You ever have that feeling when you’ve been drinking all night where you just want to fall asleep, yet for some reason you stay awake? Well, if you have then you will get a similar feeling whilst watching Don’t Go In The House. It’s not a terrible movie, it just never really gets out of first gear. Add to this the fact that there isn’t really an original bone in its body and as a movie it is just nasty, and not in a good way.
Right from the start I got the impression that all was not well with the main character Donny (Dan Grimaldi). Whilst at work in a garbage incineration plant he watches as a colleague catches on fire after an aerosol can explodes. His other fellow workers rush to help the poor guy but he just stands there frozen. Donny’s actions are explained by the fact that when he was a wee little lad his mother used to burn his arms of the stove whenever he was bad. Or whenever she thought he was bad. So that’s sets things up nicely, the old mother was abusive so I’ll turn out bad routine. See that before, many, many times. Things are about to change though, as after he returns from work he finds that his mother, whom he still lives with, has died in her room. Actually I wondered if she had been dead a while or had indeed actually just died. Either way the old dear has croaked now.
As he starts to dial the emergency services Donny starts to hear voices in his head. They are telling him that he is free to do what he wants, now that mother is no longer around. Let’s think for a second, he’s free to do what he wants now, so what will he do? Get in his truck and hit the town? Actually, yes he does, but only to search for women, take them back to his house and murder them. Due to his past bad experiences with fire, he sets up a room with metal walls, chains the women up from the ceiling then goes to work with a flamethrower. He does this for no discernible reason other than he perceives them as evil.
Watching this reminded me a little of Maniac, another nasty movie, but whereas Maniac was held together by a truly disturbing performance by Joe Spinnell, Don’t Go In The House fails miserably. The performances are okay but not spectacular, I just didn’t feel any sympathy for Donny despite his traumatized childhood.
One major gripe I did have, above all others, was the stupidity portrayed by the female characters. I mean Donny drives around picking up women, at night most of the time, then manages to persuade them to come back to his house. He normally has some semi-plausible reason for doing this, but if I was in the women’s position I’d be outta there like a shot. The screenplay left a lot to be desired let’s put it that way. Fortunately this is not a particularly graphic movie, the burnings we do see are not very convincing to look at thankfully.
Donny does keep the bodies though, and sets them up in one of the bedrooms. These look okay, kind of like a bad Italian zombie movie minus the cheese. I’d much rather watch something like Maniac or Psycho than sit though this again, both are far superior examples of the effects overbearing mothers can have on their children.
On to the extras then. Let’s see what Shriek show have given us to accompany this movie. There is an interview and a commentary from Dan Grimaldi, the interview being fairly interesting, but after watching the movie I doubt you’ll be interested.
Apart from those there is one other featurette and a few trailers. Not a great collection of extras, but probably more than the release deserved.
There are worse movies out there that is for sure, although not that many that are so damned pointless.
Rent it if you are desperate, or maybe just catch it on late night TV. Personally I wouldn’t bother with either.
