Needs More Katt

I seem to have bad luck with the House sequels.

See, you probably don’t know this, but quite a few months ago, I sat down to watch The Horror Show with the full intention of sharing my thoughts in this familiar place. I was even more enthused when I realized it was occasionally considered an in-name-only threequel to the bouncy William Kattastic House. 

(Random thought: the next installment should indeed be about a haunted bouncy house)

For whatever reason, I just couldn’t get a review written. I bumbled around a little bit, learned one lesson (“If a foot’s frying in one deep fryer, you can probably guess the rest of the parts are frying in another”) and decided to abandon ship, leaving Lance Henrikson and Michelle Pfeiffer’s less famous sister on their own.

Cut to a few months later when the horror comedy mood struck me hard enough to queue up the ACTUAL House sequel, a film that proves its pedigree by a) sharing its predecessor’s theme and b) also featuring a barfly from Cheers. Although House II: The Second Story (possible favorite subtitle ever) doesn’t actually connect to the original in terms of character, it is a little more official in terms of its franchise pedigree.

And once again, I feel incredibly apathetic writing about it.

Quick Plot: Our prologue introduces us to a married couple handing off their infant son to another while they return to their Victorian style home to confront what can only be described as a ghost cowboy looking for a crystal skull.

Already better than Indy 4

When the pair refuses him, our ghost cowboy shoots them both and sends us 25 years later to the rocking ‘80s present, where Jesse (Ellen’s Arye Gross) and his girlfriend Kate (the telepathic heroine of the seventh Friday the 13th) are now moving into the long-abandoned home. Before they even have a chance to find the nearest pizza delivery, their pals Charlie and pre-Problem Child Amy Yasbeck drunkenly drive on over to open up all sorts of house secrets, including the burial location of Jesse’s namesake and great grandpa.

Because alcohol generally makes us do really awesome things, Jesse and Charlie grab some shovels and exhume Gramps (played with the same bumpkin swagger as Royal Dano’s one year later role in Killer Klowns From Outer Space) in the hopes of finding the famed skull. Gramps turns out to be rather spry--if a bit crusty--and turns into the life of the Halloween party, stealing the show from a young Bill Maher. When a big beefy leotarded giant crashes the festivities to hijack the relic, Jesse and Charlie end up traversing the alternate dimensions hidden within the house.

Stop motion animated monsters wander, weird dino bird things squawk, and the cutest worm since Labyrinth barks its way around to help protect Gramps from the ghost cowboy he apparently killed a hundred years or so earlier. There’s also a random time warp into an Incan virgin sacrifice (maybe?), a blond being traded for another and back again, a whole lot of slapsticky skull dropping, and time travel.

You might say this is a busy film.

House II: The Second Story shares the same horror comedy vibe as its original, minus the whole PTSD Vietnam veteran angle and dead kid thing. In other words, it’s a little lighter. With its cartoon violence and colorful creatures, House II actually feels more in line with an episode of Pee-Wee’s Playhouse than The Evil Dead.

I should like House II, and I’m fairly certain that on another day, I just might. Like the original, it boasts a gleeful assortment of bizarrely fun practical monsters, plus an even goofier tone that just begs to be contagious. For whatever reason though, I found the antics somewhat tiresome. Most days, the sight of a prehistoric worm dog would make me smile. Today, I just yawned.

High Points

Prehistoric worm dog!

Aside from the prehistoric worm dog, House II’s best moments come courtesy of Cliff Clifton himself, John Ratzenberger playing the world’s most efficient electrician who also happens to have Michonne-like skills when fencing Incan spirits

Low Points

A gal can only watch so many interceptions via dinosaur of magical crystal skulls before she just stops caring

Lessons Learned

Even in the late 80s, car phones got no reception in haunted locations

Neither mummies nor baby pterodactyls make for a good excuse when caught getting friendly with your ex

‘Sir’ is a term reserved for politicians

All old folksy men played by Royal Dano in the late '80s had a lot of questions for tarnation

Rent/Bury/Buy

House II fits a very particular niche of ‘80s horror comedies, and by those terms, it’s a fun watch. I would certainly recommend fans of that era check this one out via Instant Watch, even if I seemed in this viewing to be immune to its considerable charms. I’ll chalk it up to the weather, because on a typical day, I fully endorse old grizzled zombie prospectors going on Abe Simpson-esque rants while being fueled by endless liquor. Maybe I’m the weirdo in this scenario.

Bear: It's about a bear

Perhaps my artistically inclined readers can enlighten me as to why so may paintings and sculptures are titled “Untitled.” It seems dreadfully lazy and worse, evidence that the artist didn’t actually know WHAT they were making. Calling a blank canvas with a dot of scribble something like “The War Between the Sexes” is of course quite pretentious, but doesn’t it seem incomplete to not call it SOMETHING?

I ask this question because a) I’ve always wanted to know the answer and b) I just watched a movie about a killer bear called, plain and simple, Bear. I almost wonder if the movie was written, filmed, and sold with the title “Untitled Bear Horror Movie” until someone in the art department charged with making a poster finally asked the question “Hey! Do we have a title for this thing?” The room got very quiet. Thankfully, it was Bring Your Daughter To Work Day. The graphic designer looked around for help, stumped until his 18 month old (who was just learning how to talk while playing with her Care Bear figurines) pointed to the working image and said so cutely “bear.”

And thusly Bear was titled...Bear.

Quick Plot: Brothers Nick and Sam are driving to an anniversary dinner for their parents with their ladies in tow. Oldest Sam is a smarmy yuppie type with bland wife Liz, while Nick is a rock star wannabe/recovering alcoholic early on in his relationship with the annoyingly free-spirited Christine. When their mini-van (it’s okay to laugh) breaks down just off the main highway, they meet a big ol’ grizzly bear mama and promptly shoot her dead.

Don’t you love these people?

Before you can get through one verse of “The Other Day I Saw a Bear,” grizzly mama’s old man is on the hunt. He’s bigger, meaner, smarter, and apparently, way more conniving than his late missus.

And he wants vengeance.

Bear is a very odd film in its construction. Rather than going the Grizzly Park tear-the-pretty-people-up route, it focuses tightly on its two couples and the never-quite-in-the-same-shot bear (who I’m just going to go ahead and name Charles Bronson for his revenge obsession). Our first kill comes well into the film, and perhaps because director John Rebel had what I imagine were limited monetary resources, it never really tries to make you think “yup, it would sure hurt getting mauled by a bear!” I *think* what it actually goes for is a “No! Not that character that I now know so much about!” effect instead.

In case that last paragraph didn’t give it away, I’m having an awfully hard time trying to figure out how to discuss Bear. Unlike the awful but enjoyable Grizzly Park, there’s nothing the least bit fun about this film. We’re given four characters who bicker obnoxiously, none with any real charm to make us root for their survival. At the same time, I have to appreciate the effort. The script (by Roel Reine and House’s Ethan Wiley) certainly TRIES to make Sam, Nick, LIz, and Christine into real, breathing detailed human beings. Considering my complaints about movies like The Darkest Hour (which assumes that just because they’re onscreen, we automatically care about the cast members), I do think Bear puts the right priority into crafting its characters, all of whom are capably played by their young actors. The problem though is that...well...they’re still kind of a drag.

For the first 45 minutes or so, we just get to hear Nick and Sam rehash old arguments about their differences in life. These are the kind of brothers who have discussions about how music isn’t a viable career and that’s why you’re not the favorite son! Then Liz and Christine bond over their own unhappiness with the kind of magical liquor bottle that makes you instantly drunk. It’s not the worst writing put forth in a direct-to-Netflix horror movie, but at the same time, there’s nothing overly clever or inspiring about it. I have no reason to care.

Well, I SAY that but then...well...then the bear has a flashback to the moment that played 10 minutes earlier where Sam shot his girlfriend dead, and suddenly, Bear becomes the greatest movie of all time. But then I realize there even though our titular grizzly howls with true pain, there’s no winking subtitle to translate the howl into “Nooooooooooooooooo” and I realize the film isn’t as smart as I hoped.

On the other hand, Bear is technically put together in a fairly impressive manner. Credit goes to young director Rebel and editor Herman P. Koerts for not making me realize until well after the film finished that no actor is ever ACTUALLY in the same frame as Charles Bronson. While the film never really inspires any true fear, it by no means embarrasses itself in how it uses a real-life grizzly stalking its young cast. Animals attack genre fans may at least find it a new twist on the old Cujo tale. That being said, I’d be remiss in my duties to not complain about some of the more contrived elements of the script, namely:

SPOILERS

As things are looking dimmer and dimmer for our young leads, Bear finds irresponsible rock star brother sitting alone with his stiffer WASPy sister-in-law for what turns into a rather inane downward spiral of third act revelations. Liz slept with Nick! And Sam is in financial trouble! And might go to jail for embezzlement! Bring Sam back into the van (because after he ran to get help, Charles Bronson dragged him back to die with his companions because bears are the reincarnation of Native American shamans or something something) primarily so Liz can tell both men that SHE’S PREGNANT! Which is crazy because she hasn’t had sex with her husband in five months BUT she had sex with Nick in two so HE’S THE FATHER! And of course, in the rationalizations of these characters, the entire reason the bear is hunting them with such ferocity is because they were all unhappy with their lives and nothing says new start like being psychologically tortured and maybe physically eaten by a grizzly bear.

Look, I think it’s great that a tiny li’l nature gone wild flick wanted to try its hand at Bergman-like character drama. But ultimately, having the last 20 minutes of an 80 minute bear attack film turn into Days of Our Lives (minus the possession) is sort of the equivalent of ordering a hot dog from a $1 cart for a quick bite only to then wait an hour while the vendor shows off his origami skills with the bun. It just misses the point.

High Notes

It’s always a pleasure when the most annoying character gets eaten first

Low Notes

I understand that it’s nighttime and bears don’t have track lighting, but it’s still nice for the audience to see what’s actually going on most of the time

Lessons Learned

Pregnant also means ‘with child,’ or ‘in the family way’

Unlike rock ‘n roll stars, real people don’t bed someone new every night

As I recently pointed out with Basic Instinct 2, having a character smoke in a no-smoking zone doesn’t make her a rebel; it makes her disrespectful and obnoxious

Rent/Bury/Buy

Bear is not what you would traditionally call a good movie, but it does manage to rise above its natural limitations. The cast isn’t quite memorable, but they service the clumsy writing with all their hearts and newbie director John Rebel makes the best out of some fairly terrible material. I only recommend it as an Instant Watch stream when you really need a bear fix and feel like seeing an incredibly inconsistent attempt. It’s not satisfying in the least, but it’s strange and capable enough of a film to warrant some of your time. I’d prefer an origami swan hot dog bun, but sometimes you just have to compromise.

KattHouse

House is one of those ‘80s VHS staples that nobody actually seems to remember. While few could forget those luscious mulleted curls exploding out of William Katt’s head, the movie itself always felt more relevant as a perennial fixture (along with its three sequels) on video store shelves. We all THOUGHT we saw it at one point in time, but did we care?

Quick Plot: William Golden God Katt plays Roger Corbett, a successful horror novelist stuck with writer’s block as he struggles to pen his memoirs of his dark secrets in Vietnam. Following the earlier death of his son and subsequent divorce from his primetime soap star wife, Roger moves into the mysterious (and titular) house of his aunt, a batty artist who hanged herself in the film’s prologue.

It doesn’t take long for gooey monsters to pop out of closets and mounted trophy swordfish to flop about-

-yes, just like Billy Bass

It's tough being a writer, as Roger now has to balance ghost hunting/tolerating with remembering his days of combat beside good old genre stalwart Richard Moll. Despite the amusing/annoying aide of nosy neighbor George Wendt, the misdirected flirtations of a sexy foreign neighbor, and the sympathy of his ex-wife, Roger can’t seem to catch a break.

House is a most definite horror comedy, a subgenre that can degrade faster than almost any other with the passage of time. Any comeror or horromedy (yeah, I’ll stop doing that) generally relies on the gameness of its cast and willingness of its audience to let loose and laugh at what, with the removal of a few musical cues or altered facial expressions, is expected to incite fear in another title. 

Does House work? Yes and no. Released in an age rife with haunted homes on camera (the Amityville series and Poltergeist were already sequels in), House has plenty of fun poking around at the squishy goblins and floating tools so identified with ‘80s suburban horror. The monster designs aren’t aiming for a Thing-like iconography, but there’s a great sense of personality about their look that finds a nice balance between the scary and silly. William Katt is one of those innately likable actors with a natural charisma that makes him easy to watch, an important factor since he’s in every scene of the film.

So what doesn’t work? Well, it’s not so much about what fails as much as it is what doesn’t go far enough. House is a tame film, one working hard for chuckles rather than laughs. Directed by Friday the 13th Parts 2 & 3 and Halloween: H20’s Steve Miner, it plays in the shallow end of the gorgeously kept inground pool without daring to cross the deeper territory of Evil Dead 2 or Dead Alive. That’s fine, as an attempt for all-out goofiness that fails can be painful for all involved. But ultimately, it makes House--which went on to slowly reap three sequel(ishe)s--fairly forgettable entertainment.

High Points

Even though he doesn’t get to have quite as much fun as I’d like to see, it’s always pleasant to see Richard Moll working in a film not tarnished by grain on a Mill Creek transfer

There’s a wonderful passing moment where Roger sits down to watch his wife’s Dynasty-like soap, a fine reminder of how great those storylines could be. Sample line of dialogue: “I can’t hide the fact that I’ve been a male prostitute for most of my life.” Can I watch THAT movie please?

Low Points

The tone is more than a bit confusing, especially when we consider the fact that there’s suicide, Vietnam trauma, and a dead child lurking around the peripheral of House’s main plotline

Lessons Learned

The best way to get over an ex you still harbor feelings for? Shoot a monster wearing its clothing

Solitude is always better with someone

When the sexy blond neighbor asks you if you like to play, she might indeed be referring to Chutes & Ladders or Hide ‘n Seek

Fashion Alert

Hey able-bodied men: whenever you’re ready, the world is welcoming of the sexy deep V-neck sweater to make its triumphant return

Rent/Bury/Buy

House is currently streaming on Netflix Instant, which makes it fine for a fluffy afternoon with the kids (minus the suicide and PTSD). It’s light, goofy, but not over the top comedy with the look of a horror film. Nostalgic ‘80s fans will certainly appreciate some of its references, while younger audiences may just find it on their level. Don’t ring the bell expecting to be scared, but do take comfort in knowing you’ll be staring at William Katt’s baby blue eyes for 90 minutes. 

To each her own.