House is the Most Insane Movie I've Ever Seen (1977)

I picked my movie for today out of sheer curiosity. I'd seen trailers and clips for Nobuhiko Obayashi's 1977 film "House" before and it always looked completely insane. Imagine my surprise when I saw it for sale in the bluray isle at my local big box store. I HAD to have it! I had no idea if it was really any good, but I just had to get it to see for myself what this crazy movie was all about. Figuring this was one of those movies that's better with friends, I got a bunch of people together to watching this with me. Hit the jump to see how the whole thing turned out.


The story of this movie is that the summer vacation plans for 7 schoolgirls have fallen through, so one of them suggests they go to her aunt's house who lives way out in the countryside. She hasn't seen or spoken with her aunt in ages, so she writes a letter requesting if she and her friends can visit for a week... after she's already invited them to the house. People in this movie just seem inconsiderate and clueless. Anyways, the aunt's weird cat appears out of nowhere and a few days later a letter arrives from the aunt saying how she's been waiting to hear from her and of course they're all more than welcome to visit. The movie then proceeds to get weirder and crazier as strange and deadly things start to occur all around them.

I've been pretty vague about the character's names for a reason. They're crazy! The main girl with the aunt is named Gorgious, and her 6 girlfriends are named Fantasy, Sweet, Professor, Melody, Kung Fu, and Mac. As far as I could tell her aunt is just referred to as Aunt. Their names also let you know what they're best at, or at least what their personality is like. Sweet is the sweet one who is also extra girly, screams at the slightest anything, and loves to clean (welcome back to 70s stereotyping). Fantasy is always daydreaming, Professor has glasses and loves to read. Melody can play music, Kung Fu knows Kung Fu, and Gorgious is the pretty one who is obsessed with makeup and looking good. Oh, and Mac is the "fat" one, so they nicknamed her Mac... I don't get it either.


Fantasy gets bitten on the ass by the flying head of one of her friends

The effects and "scares" are probably the best part of the movie. They're just so bad, they're hilarious. I don't think this movie was made intending to be a comedy, but we were laughing at it more than anything else. It just fails at everything it does so well! The editing is jumpy and cuts back and forth to odd things. Odd screen wipes are used, some random nudity is scattered around, and the characters are all just mindless. Weird stuff is going on all around them, and they hardly notice, with the exception of Fantasy, but all her friends ignore her because she's always imagining things. Even after 2 of their friends have already met their ends, which Fantasy witnesses in one way or another, no one thinks anything out of the ordinary is happening.

It's around this time the drugs clearly kicked in with the director as the whole thing devolves into one giant drug trip. Everything hits the fan and every weird 70s era film trick is used to make the whole thing a sight you have to see to believe. I particularly liked the short scene fairly early in the film where it showed one girl opening and closing her eyes, one at a time, alternating back and forth. The camera then switches to her view of another girl and the perspective flip flops back and forth as if you're seeing from her eyes. The scene then continues as normal. It was just so pointless, I loved it.


The drugs kick into high gear!

 House is definitely a cult classic and I urge any film fans to seek this out. It's true the bluray was pretty expensive, but it would probably work well as a rental or if it is on Netflix (which I appologize that I don't know if it is). Watch this with a group of friends and just revel in its silliness. This movie exemplifies the phrase "it's so bad it's good!"