The Houses of Doom: The Sweet House of WTF?

 

Last week I talked about The Houses of Doom – The House of Clocks. Seeing as I committed myself to watching all four films in the series, I watched the second Lucio Fulci entry: The Sweet House of Horrors (1989).

Okay, this is not fun for me as I hate tearing down the hard work of others but I'm not going to sit here and lie to you so here we go. Oh boy, where to begin? Alright, my usual unwillingness to include spoilers is not in effect here so if you want to watch this (don't), go watch it now and come back later. SPOILERS from here on.

The opening scene shows a burglar sneaking around a mansion, trying to open a wall safe when the couple who owns the place comes home. Because he's the worst burglar ever, a sloppy fight breaks out, ending in some patented Fulci gore and murder before the burglar runs away. We are then introduced to the children of the dead couple together with their aunt and uncle at the funeral of said couple.

These kids are some of the worst child characters in any movie, but it's not the fault of the actors, they only did as they were told. The spend half the funeral sobbing (understandable) and half popping bubblegum and giggling at the priest (ludicrous) going back and forth between both. We quickly deduce who the burglar/murderer is as he is the only one at the funeral who acts suspicious. What?

Once back home “strange” things happen, pushing the aunt to want to sell and move. Obviously the kids are against this, but when the real estate agent falls and breaks his leg the kids laugh gleefully and mock him through song, while he's writhing in agony on the floor. Again, what?

Eventually the kids parents manifest as ghosts and play with their children, but not before tormenting the murderer to insanity so that he jumps under a truck and dies. For some reason there is also a ghost dog that is otherwise never mentioned.

The aunt and uncle who can't see the ghosts are understandably worried about the kids so they hire a melodramatic exorcist. He in turn yells a lot, poses dramatically and finally picks up a magic rock causing his hand to melt as he screams in pain while the kids laugh and point. The End. Double What?

The Sweet House of Horror is undoubtedly one of the worst movies I have ever seen, and I've seen some real stinkers in my time. The story has no focus. Is it a mystery who the killer is? No. Is it a ghost story? No, not really. Is it a... screw it, it's just sloppy, badly acted and lousy all around. When the killer tries to cover up the murder by staging it as a car accident, you can clearly see that the car is empty before it's pushed off a cliff. No dummies, no nothing. A different camera angle would have sufficed, but no.

If this had been someone's first movie, I could maybe understand, but Fulci had 55 director credits before this and 61 writer credits, so there is just no excuse. Even a tight budget doesn't explain all the crap this movie contains. I skipped a lot in the synopsis above, but it's mostly the children spouting nonsense. Nothing of interest happens after five minutes. Like House of Clocks there isn't really anyone to cheer on here. In a similar film you might root for the kids, but they are too unlikable and cruel. They actually rival the Bob from House by the Cemetery in terms of sheer irritation. 

Do I recommend this movie? No! The initial gore could be of interest to a gore-hound, but unless you are a completionist who absolutely has to see every Fulci movie, avoid this like the plague. It's only a horror movie in the loosest sense of the word apart from the early gore.

I really hope the next two movies directed by Umberto Lenzi are better.

 

That's that and all that. Join me again next time and until then, have a great and safe week!