dontgointhehouse

Don't Go In The House is a slasher flick with a difference... that difference being that the killer in this movie doesn't hack young co-eds to pieces with a carving knife , but incinerates them with a blowtorch instead.

Donny is pretty much an urban version of Norman Bates. He lives with his overly domineering mother in a large sprawling mansion on the outskirts of the city. His passion isn't for taxidermy though ; he likes nothing better than setting things alight. Donny's love of fire began when his mother punished him as a child by burning his little arms in the flames of the family oven.

Not everything's bad for our unbalanced friend though , because unlike many of us he has been fortunate to combine his interest with a solid income. He spends his waking hours happily working at a garbage incineration plant. He only has one workmate at the plant, a guy who looks a little like a young Dick Miller.

One day, one of Donny's fellow workers accidentally sets himself on fire , and instead of helping the others put him out , he just stands there admiring those beautyful flames. His boss flies right off the handle , calling him a 'Freak and a Fag'. He doesn't mind the freak label , but takes great offence at the fag label because it isn't true. To top off his bad day , he goes home to find his evil mother dead in her favorite chair. At first he panics , but then voices in his head start telling him he's finally free.

He starts jumping on his mothers antique furniture , playing really bad seventies disco music as loud as he wants , and putting out cigarettes on his mothers favorite statue. This Falling Down style rebellious streak doesn't last long though. He soon hears his mothers voice demanding to know what he's doing. His already fragile world is crumbling around him , so he does what any self respecting nutjob with an unusually bizarre attraction to fire would do : he covers the walls of his basement with steel , hooks, and chains, and builds his own crematorium designed especially for young and incredibly stupid starlets.

He starts prowling the streets , picking up women , and luring them back to his house. Once there , he chains them up in the steel room , puts on a very snazzy flame retardent suit , and barbecues them with a homemade flamethrower. His serial killer antics are going along nicely until his Dick Miller lookalike buddy sets him up on a blind date. Donny wigs out over a lit candle on the table , setting his dates head on fire with it ( overuse of hairspray can be hazardous to your health). After being beaten senseless by her brother , he spirals even deeper into insanity resulting in even more flame grilled mayhem.

While it is by no means a classic of the slasher genre , Don't go in the House did beat a lot of them to the punch , and even had shades of characterisation and originality. Donny is one of the few slasher villains ever to have any characterisation. We see him at work interacting with his workmates , shopping , and even on a date (which is highly unusual since most slasher villains don't think about that sort of thing). Some of the scenes were downright surreal... one minute Donny would be burning a young girl to a charred mess , and the next we'd see him shopping for appalling seventies fashions and interacting with people.

All of the charred corpses looked very effective , and the scenes where they were coming after Donny in his hallucinations are excellent. The makeup in this movie is some of the most convincing I've seen for a while. Even just these scenes are a pretty good reason to check out Don't Go In The House. The acting is of course pretty uneven , as is the plot at times , but if you're looking for a slasher movie that's a little different , and are prepared to overlook its shortcomings ( which you probably are if you're a cult film fan) , then you'll find this a mildly entertaining timewaster.