I just watched this film again after a very long time. The only other time I viewed this film is when it was released as my parents took me to see this one in the theater. Why we went to see this, is beyond me, but while this film is quite bad it is still rather cool we saw kind of a random film like this in the theater. Back in the day, movie theaters did not just do Hollywood blockbusters week after week, during off times they would show more obscure films like this. House By the Cemetery is another I had the fortune of seeing in the theater (or misfortune). I watched it again and was amazed at how short it was. That is the best thing to be said about the film, it was very short. It was done by Charles Band though of Full Moon fame, so I guess it should not have been that surprising seeing as how many of his films clock in at under 1 hour and 20 minutes. Heck, if you do not sit through the credits here, the thing will clock in under and hour and ten minutes! The film is very random as they had multiple directors for reasons unknown as it really is not an anthology and it is not as if the story is vastly different in the 'segments' if you will. Just seems like a film that seemed like a cool idea in someone's head, but as they filmed they quickly realized they really did not have all that much material to even make it.
The story starts with a dream sequence, at least on the DVD I got. I, for the life of me, do not remember this sequence from years ago. However, the lead girl gets fully nude, so I am thinking perhaps this was not in the cut I saw back then because that is something I would have remembered. Kind of like how I remembered Trash dancing in the graveyard in "Return of the Living Dead". It then switches to a tech geek and establishes his relationship between he and a girl with a throwaway line about him being in an experiment that made him fully integrate with his computer and which seemed to have no real bearing on the story. Then they are both transported to a realm where Bull, oh I mean Mestema sends the hero to do different challenges. The hero must clear all seven or Mestema will have he and the girl's souls! The challenges are random and do not really seem like they have any reason to them! The first is in an icy museum where the figures come to life, the second a cave where the hero must battle the dead, the third a Wasp concert, the fourth battling a giant and little people, the fifth the hero must stop a serial killer. This one seems so out of place and is the longest, so I'm guessing it was needed to be so long to pad the film a little and save some money as it inexplicably took place in the real world. The sixth made no sense as it was the hero throwing rocks at a troll creature and for reasons unknown lasers were shooting and finally a road warrior type area where they use some vehicles that looked left over from the set of Megaforce. Inbetween the challenges the hero would debate Mestema, they had to do something to fill the time I guess.
So this film is random and it just does not work very well. The challenges just are not set up well as there seems to be absolutely no purpose to any of them except the serial killer one. That is like the only one where any kind of rules are established. The most vague is that one where he is having a rock fight with a troll. Richard Moll is not as good here as he normally is in roles like this and the hero is a complete nobody. Still, all this negativity I am throwing at this film and I still have to say it was very quick. Not like it was a painful shot. It felt like a very short film, I have watched a few films where the running time is short like this, but they still take forever. Not this one, I am guessing the randomness of the challenges helps this as at least you are seeing new stuff every few seconds.
The story starts with a dream sequence, at least on the DVD I got. I, for the life of me, do not remember this sequence from years ago. However, the lead girl gets fully nude, so I am thinking perhaps this was not in the cut I saw back then because that is something I would have remembered. Kind of like how I remembered Trash dancing in the graveyard in "Return of the Living Dead". It then switches to a tech geek and establishes his relationship between he and a girl with a throwaway line about him being in an experiment that made him fully integrate with his computer and which seemed to have no real bearing on the story. Then they are both transported to a realm where Bull, oh I mean Mestema sends the hero to do different challenges. The hero must clear all seven or Mestema will have he and the girl's souls! The challenges are random and do not really seem like they have any reason to them! The first is in an icy museum where the figures come to life, the second a cave where the hero must battle the dead, the third a Wasp concert, the fourth battling a giant and little people, the fifth the hero must stop a serial killer. This one seems so out of place and is the longest, so I'm guessing it was needed to be so long to pad the film a little and save some money as it inexplicably took place in the real world. The sixth made no sense as it was the hero throwing rocks at a troll creature and for reasons unknown lasers were shooting and finally a road warrior type area where they use some vehicles that looked left over from the set of Megaforce. Inbetween the challenges the hero would debate Mestema, they had to do something to fill the time I guess.
So this film is random and it just does not work very well. The challenges just are not set up well as there seems to be absolutely no purpose to any of them except the serial killer one. That is like the only one where any kind of rules are established. The most vague is that one where he is having a rock fight with a troll. Richard Moll is not as good here as he normally is in roles like this and the hero is a complete nobody. Still, all this negativity I am throwing at this film and I still have to say it was very quick. Not like it was a painful shot. It felt like a very short film, I have watched a few films where the running time is short like this, but they still take forever. Not this one, I am guessing the randomness of the challenges helps this as at least you are seeing new stuff every few seconds.