Review of Hell House (2001) by Nathan N — 22 Aug 2009

A mostly bland and uninformative documentary covering the evangelical Christian brand of the haunted house and its self-contradictory philosophy. Minus some clever edits which reveal where the film makers stand with regards to the nonsense they're documenting (firmly on the side of the rest of the world, which favors common sense and moderate religion to factually and spiritually void scare tactics), there isn't much juice here.

In one sequence, a young man confronts the leaders of the hell house and schools them on both the history of the bible and how one should interpret it. Of course, the morons in charge of this atrocity don't care to listen to any of it. I wish there was more of this sort of thing in the picture - the passive indifference of the camera and the complete lack of an MC (usually the director in documentaries) makes the whole film appear like an endorsement.

The rest of the movie, though, documents how the assholes in charge of the Hell House believe the Star of David is a pentagram, that AIDS kills you in only a few days and exclusively targets gay men, that Harry Potter leads to satanism, and a laughably uneducated take on the pill RU486 (shown here to cause intense bleeding from the vagina). Throughout all of this, no attempt is made by the filmmakers to correct the uninformed or take any stance in the proceedings as they unfold. It's frustrating.

Watch only if you wish to be pissed off by the uniquely American movement known as evangelical Christianity. If you are looking to be informed, or if you are looking for a good smack-down of the mouth breathers who run such facilities by the hand of an educated film maker, look elsewhere.