1999
Reviewed by D.R. Hesse
1/2/2012
Language: English
Original Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Directed by Jack Reed aka David DeCoteau
Cast: Ariauna Albright, Matt Raftery and Monica Serene Garnich
Synopsis
A bunch of young people are invited to a party by their strange classmate only to find that they are direct descendents of the people who brutally killed a witch 300 years ago.
DVD Release
Witchouse was released to DVD by Full Moon in 1999. The video is presented in 1.33:1 fullscreen and looks pretty good considering it's a low budget flick. The film was apparently shot on 35mm film so I wonder what a widescreen print of the film would look like. Audio is in stereo and is inconsistent in places. Sometimes the dialog comes over as too loud and sometimes it's too soft. Overall it's not that bad.
Extras
Cast- limited text biographies of the principal cast. Biographes included for Ariauna Albright, David Oren Ward, Matt Raferty, Brooke Mueller, Ashley Mckinney and Ryan Scott Greene. Interesting to find out that David Oren Ward was killed not too long after making the film from a Road Rage incident. Skip.
Wares- Full Moon's plug for their merchandise on their website. The information is of course outdated but if you are curious to check out their stuff you can now view it on their up to date website. There's another link on this screen that shows a short video clip (1:30) of the Puppet Master Action Figures. Skip.
Website- Another plug for their website. Outdated information of course. Skip.
Trailers- Various trailers for other Full Moon Titles.
- Bride of the Head of the Family(2:11) - A promo for a sequel to the film "Head of the Family" that hasn't materialized yet. Pretty Cool though. Recommended.
- Castle Freak(2:08) - Stuart Gordon flick.
- Subspecies IV: Bloodstorm(2:22) - Part 4 of their vampire series.
- Curse of the Puppetmaster(1:31) - Sixth film in their very popular Puppet Master series.
- Vampire Journals(2:34) - A spin off film from the Subspecies series.
- Witchouse(1:53) - This film!
Thoughts
Witchouse is a low budget film that tries to be in the same vein as Night of the Demons. Directed by the infamous low budget director David DeCoteau (under the pseudonym of Jack Reed) we have a rather lame attempt in crossing witches with demons. Stop if you've heard this one before : A bunch of kids end up going to a spooky house for a party only to find out that someone or something wants to kill them. The story comes from Full Moon mastermind Charles Band. Now I have a love/hate relationship with Charles Band. I really love the fact he's still making low budget movies regardless of how good or bad they are. What I do dislike is how Charles Band doesn't own the rights to the majority of his films. The DVD's he sells through his websites are usually poor quality and are comparable to VHS rips. There's horror stories about people who have found the negatives of some of his films in a trash bin behind his office. Sorry - end rant.
So we start the film off with the teens arriving to the house. The first two arrivals are quickly killed off after trying to find a place for a quick round of sex. The rest of the crowd arrives and the party begins! A party with a pentagram has to be a riot right?. So the stereotypes are in full effect here as we have a "bad-ass" chick, a stoner, a nerd, a horny couple and a few other rather useless characters. We are introduced to Elizabeth (played wonderfully by Ashley McKinney) who is described as the weird classmate who likes to pull pranks. We'll she's pulling the ultimate prank by conjuring up her dead witch relative named Lilith (Ariauna Albright). In true horror movie fashion, all the party guests are descendents of the people responsible for the death of Lilith the witch.
The one thing I was rather impressed with was the make-up effects. While it could be uneven at times, the demon make up and the Lilith makeup actually looked pretty decent. I guess you could say Lilith looked rather comical but she definitely stood out. Another thing that was pretty impressive was the art decoration. The old house looked surprisingly well furnished and suited the film quite nicely.
Acting overall was pretty bad. The "bad-ass" chick probably was the worst out of the bunch. All her dialog delivery was atrocious and cringe worthy. The best acting in my opinion was done by Ashley McKinney, who sadly hasn't been in anything other than this film.
One thing that confused me was the rules on how one becomes one of these demons. At first I thought that someone had to be turned by Lilith or killed by one of the other demons. But there's a scene in the basement where one of the girls just randomly starts turning into one of them and the only thing that seems to happen is she catches on fire.
Conclusions
Witchouse has a few things going for it but the first 2/3's of the movie are a bore. Once the demon stuff kicks in it gets better but you've already seen it done better in other demon films.
Rating
3/10
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