HALLOWEEN HORRORFEST 2020: Hell House LLC (2015)

Our sponsor today is Lauren A. Kennedy who, besides having a role in the film we’re about to discuss, is playing the role of Katchoo in the upcoming audio adaptation of Terry Moore’s classic comic book Strangers In Paradise.  I am writing and directing this massive undertaking, and Book One is tentatively ready to drop during the holiday season this year.  For updates and further information, check out the Ocadecagonagon Theater Works site!

Lauren does not represent a particular charity, but she does request that everyone reading this go vegan for a day.

And yes, the film we will be discussing is Hell House LLC, a found footage film written and directed by Stephen Cognetti, set in the Rockland County but shot in Pennsylvania.

As some may have gathered from comments I made when discussing Host earlier, I have issues with the found footage genre.  I certainly understand the charm of this method of story telling to independent filmmakers--this is a way to tell a story potentially bigger than your budget because you can use commercial grade equipment.  The problem is that when found footage burst onto the scene with The Blair Witch Project*, then revived with the success of Paranormal Activity, it was perceived as a way to tell any kind of story when it is, in fact, extremely limited as to the type of story it can tell effectively.  Far too often, a filmmaker uses found footage to tell a story that was told many, many times before narratively thinking the gimmick will make it new, not realizing the strictures put upon him by found footage makes telling that story far too difficult.

This is not the case necessarily in this film, but the problems I had with it do stem from the found footage conceit (and a couple of scenes that were cut from the print I viewed, but were restored for the director’s cut, and a desire for two sequels, but we’ll get to that in a bit).

In 2009, the town of Abaddon, New York suffered a tragedy when the Hell House Haunted Attraction, run by the titular Hell House LLC, caused fifteen deaths and a load of serious injuries.  Diane Graves (Alice Bahlke), making a documentary on the tragedy, is given a set of videos taken by the staff--mainly Paul (Gore Adams)--of the weeks leading up to and the night of the tragedy.  While searching through the footage, we learn that the hotel has something of a reputation stemming from some disappearances and the suicide of the owner twenty years previously....and that that owner’s decision to build the hotel in Abaddon may have been made for diabolical purposes.

I checked out of this film pretty early, and the structure is the main reason why.  By setting this up as a documentary about a past tragedy, we know how the films is going to go--we know the ending, we’re just waiting for the film to get there and show it to us.  I found it very difficult to get invested in these characters, many of which were not fully realized and, in the case of Paul and the organization’s leader Alex (Danny Bellini), too obnoxious for me to identify with.  I could pretty much figure out the scares before they happened, almost all of them, I suspect, inspired by the chair sequence in Poltergiest.  You know what I mean--we see something that shouldn’t be there, we’re distracted, and when we return that thing is gone or in a different position.  Cognetti did not bring anything I hadn’t seen before in the film, and I could count off the required beats in the story.  In fact, I was surprised that certain beats weren’t there--one in particular involving Lauren’s character Melissa, who is one of the actresses in the attraction who Paul is...well, perving on.

Well it turns out some of those beats, beats that would have explained some things and made the narrative make sense, were apparently cut out and restored later for the director’s cut.  One scene makes Alex’s motivations in insisting they make this hotel the attraction even after the others are beginning to feel otherwise much, much clearer.  Another makes it clear what exactly is happening during the climatic chaos and ties in with what seemed to be some throwaway dialogue by one of the ‘documentary’s’ talking heads to make some of the back story teased out in drips and drabs more significant.  These scenes were not included in the ninety-one minute cut I viewed, and while I may still not have hailed it as a masterpiece, I may have rated it higher.  I expected another beat, a beat that is built up very pointedly, would also illuminate another narrative thread that I couldn’t glean from what I saw, but it turns out that beat was being withheld on purpose; it seems Cognetti always planned this as a trilogy, and wanted to keep that beat a mystery to be revealed in Hell House LLC 2: The Abaddon Hotel.

Here’s a word of advice to future filmmakers (and major studios, for that matter): Make a good movie first, then worry about sequels.  Learning that the question I wanted answered was intentionally left hanging over the film in the hopes I would want to see another bugged the crap out of me.

If I had not learned about these facts from a video on the FoundFlix YouTube Channel, I would have written this off as a mostly incoherent mess.  Knowing this, I feel a little more positive about it, but not positive enough to put my thumb up for it.  However, I say that to say this--as a found footage film, it most likely wasn’t meant for me, who has an aversion to that sub-genre.  If you don’t share my dislike of found footage, you might actually quite enjoy it.  I mean, it’s fairly slickly produced and the people I know who have seen it besides myself gave it positive press.  I may be in the minority here, so I will not give you a decision.  If you like found footage or don’t have feelings about it one way or another, I don’t see any reason why you won’t enjoy it on some level...just be sure you see that director’s cut!

Our sponsor tomorrow is my very own lab monkey who suffers through The Honeywell Experiment, Chris Honeywell.  Chris has chosen Martin, which may very well be my favorite George Romero film!

There are Nine Sponsorship Slots Left in the Halloween Horrorfest this year.  To claim one, do one of four things:

1) You can become a Domicile of Dread Patreon at any level.  Patreons always get a free slot, as well as advance access to podcasts and other goodies!

2) You can buy me a coffee at Ko-Fi.  Suggested donation is $3

3) You can make a donation to Black Lives Matter.  Suggested donation is $10.  Please forward your receipt to me as proof.

4) You can choose to make a donation to the charity chosen by a sponsor on his/her/their day. Like with the third possibility, please forward me proof of donation.

As with last year, if I end up with more sponsors than there are days in October, I will go into Horrorfest Overtime, which means Halloween goes into November for me--and you!

 *--Yes, I know many films predate that one in using found footage tropes...but keep your Cannibal Holocaust, this was the film that made this sub-genre popular and successful.