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[B-D Review] ‘A Haunted House’ is Impossible to Find Amusing

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Reviewed by Mike Ferraro

Malcolm (Marlon Wayans) and Kisha (Essence Atkins) play a couple about to open a new chapter in their relationship when they decide to move in together. Malcolm, of course, decides to turn a camera on and record his new lifestyle with his significant other. However, it is Kisha who seems to feel the presence of something supernatural as soon as she steps foot in the new house.

A Haunted House, written by Rick Alvarez and Marlon Wayans, directed by newcomer Michael Tiddes, makes no attempts to be an original entry in an otherwise dead spoof genre. It’s full of jokes only a failed stand-up comedian could deliver while performing at a lower-end buffet in Vegas.

The film mostly follows the premise of Paranormal Activity series, while also tackling other recent flicks like The Devil Inside and Insidious. As it has been said hundreds of times before, if Airplane started the spoof trend, A Haunted House is a homeless vagrant dropping a load on an already decomposed corpse. The earlier was smart in its attempts to satirize, while the latter thinks only anal sex and fart jokes can earn laughter and respect.

They can’t. Especially after the fourth or fifth time they appear in the film.

This picture runs about 86 long minutes, and most of that length comes from the editors not knowing where to pull the plug on certain gags. For example, there is a scene in which Malcolm prepares himself for first-night-living-together sex by practicing on a couple of stuffed animals. Even if only the shot lasted about 2 minutes, it’s a struggle to keep watching past the 5-second mark.

To say the film is rife with stereotypes would be doing it a kind service; instead, there isn’t a shot throughout its entire run time that doesn’t contain some unoriginal racial or homophobic joke. Like when Kisha calls in her “gangsta” cousins to “pop a certain cap” into their invisible intruder. Perhaps this would be relative, and maybe even humorous to some degree, if that culture were still in the limelight (like maybe back in the early 1990s when Boyz N the Hood or Menace II Society were fresh in our cinematic minds).

This isn’t a picture that is going to earn anything less than an R-rating either. The MPAA note that it contains “crude and sexual content, language, and some drug use” but the real mystery is why the filmmakers went this direction. Because it would be impossible to imagine any adult human being actually finding this film humorous, interesting, or even halfway entertaining.

Perhaps the most intelligent joke of the entire film is when Malcolm defecates on the ashes of Kisha’s father. We can assume that’s just a visual metaphor for what this picture is doing to us while we watch it. Or maybe we are just looking into it too much.

Thankfully, the blu-ray release for A Haunted House only contains one single extra (outside of some previews). “How to Survive a Paranormal Presence” is a misleading title for a brief, commercial-length, making-of featurette that contains some short interviews with the cast. Again, it’s too short to even gain focus and the film is just too bland to even care if it were longer and more in-depth.

It seemed like cinema audiences were safe for a while – the spoof genre felt almost extinct. But 2013 is bringing it back, first with A Haunted House (which has already earned a sequel in production), and then with Scary Movie 5.

The horror, the horror.

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‘Herencia Diabólica’ – 1993’s “Mexican Child’s Play” Finally Has a Blu-ray Release [Review]

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Did you know that there is a Child’s Play-inspired film from Mexico? If you didn’t, you can thank Vinegar Syndrome’s new label Degausser Video for making 1993’s Herencia Diabólica available for the masses to watch. Or at least for the VS hardcore fanbase, Chucky completists and anyone else who needs something like this in their lives.

Director Alfredo Salazar, known for his writing connection to the 70s Santo film series, also serves as the writer here to bring us a film seemingly inspired from the Child’s Play franchise. While it has been recently labeled as the “Mexican Child’s Play” (there’s a special feature on the disc with that very title), the killer doll concept is where the comparison should start and end. Despite having some seeds planted by that franchise, Salazar delivers a story that blossoms into something unique.

Tony (Roberto Guinar) receives a letter informing him that his aunt has died, and he has inherited her estate in Mexico. He quits his job and uproots his life in New York with his wife Annie (Holda Ramírez) to relocate south of the border and move into his new crib. Now I know what you’re thinking, what person just quits their job and drags their wife to another country without having reliable monetary income? Tony does, everyone, Tony does.

And what’s the first thing they do once they arrive in Mexico and check out the estate? They hit the bedroom, naturally. We are treated to a sex scene with an erotica song that feels like a knockoff of “Sadness” by Enigma (remember them?). Sounds fun and all, but the scene takes place completely in the dark and we see absolutely nothing. Maybe that’s why the sexy-time tune was pumping, so we could know what was exactly going down.

While Tony goes on a job interview, Annie explores the estate’s grounds in a tedious chore to experience, going room by room, plodding along. But it does lead us to her discovery of our antagonist—the evil clown doll, Payasito! Of all the things in the house, she decides to bring this monstrosity down to show Tony when he gets home. What an exciting way to celebrate (sic)! Then out of nowhere, she spouts off some exposition about rumors that Tony’s aunt dabbled in the dark arts and now we know where our title Diabolical Inheritance (the English translation for Herencia Diabólica) originates. For those of you who keep score for things like that.

Before proceeding with this review, you really need to visualize what Payasito looks like to truly embrace the rest of the film’s shenanigans. While Chucky resembles a cute ginger child, Payasito resembles a small clown that is much larger in stature than Chucky. That’s because Payasito is performed by an actor (Margarito Esparaza) in clown cosplay whenever he’s on the move (like Mannequin 2), and makes some really horrible facial expressions. Chucky dresses in “Good Guys” overalls and a striped shirt, but Payasito wears a new wave Santa hat while sporting a Sgt. Pepper jacket and Peter Pan tights. As you can now tell, he is quite beautiful.

Back to our story, Payasito begins to spook Annie cerebrally until she becomes unnerved to the point of having a complete mental break down, making her easy prey to eliminate. She dies but the unborn child survives, with Tony believing that her death was caused by her mental instability. Fast forward some years later and the couple’s surviving spawn has grown into child Roy (Alan Fernando), who at this point has already bonded with Payasito to help him over the loss of his mother. Dun-dun-duuunnn!

Meanwhile wealthy Tony remains single, still grieving his late wife, until his blonde assistant Doris encourages him to move on with his life and start seeing other people. And by other people, she naturally means herself. As the old Kanye West song lyric goes, “I ain’t saying she’s a gold digger…”, and it seems that she might be until we learn more about her character. Doris is played by the stunning Lorena Hererra who has an extremely extensive resume in Mexico, and she carries most of the film quite well during the feature’s second half. The singer and former Playboy centerfold for their Mexico edition is by far the most recognizable face in the cast.

Doris and Tony do indeed hookup and she moves into La casa de Herencia, where she does her best to impress Roy and lessen his obsession with the doll. There is a scene where they go to a nearby park without Payasito that is filled with famous fairytale figures, such as Pinocchio, Cinderella and King Kong! What, you didn’t know King Kong is a fairytale? Me neither. But Roy continues to be obsessed with Payasito after their trip, much to Doris’ chagrin.

Her actions to separate him from Roy gets Payasito angry, setting up the film’s most memorable scene. We already know that Payasito is a devil doll like Chucky, but now we learn he also has the power to invade people’s dreams like Freddy Krueger! Does Payasito enter the dream world and concoct a creative way to kill Doris in her sleep? No, he harnesses his power to sexually assault her instead. Yes that actually happens. After she awakens, Doris grabs the doll and tosses him into a lake, only to find him waiting for her by the time she gets back to the house. So now we know he also maintains the ability to “transport” like Jason Voorhees too. This doll is the total package!

More insanity happens before we close out the film with the longest victim chase sequence ever. It makes the previously mentioned painful house search scene seem like an eyeblink. It feels like it’s the film’s entire third act, filled with so much padding that you could soundproof an entire three-story house.

So how’s the transfer? Considering it was created using a mix of VHS and film source elements from 1993, they did one heck of a job! The work they put into it is especially noticeable in the dream invasion sequence, with the pulsing multi-colored psychedelic visuals. Super trippy stuff. Even the film’s score provides a pretty chill vibe, during the times when Payasito isn’t on the prowl.

If anything you read has piqued your interest in the very least, you should give it a shot. But if not, it is best to leave this doll on the shelf.

Herencia Diabólica is now available to purchase at VinegarSyndrome.com.

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