House of Bodies (2013)

Brilliant and touching

A Disappointing Continuation

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The premise is a good one. Serial killer is caught. House he murdered victims in is turned into a webcam house. New girl befriends first client, mute boy. Terrence Howard goes to interview serial killer because new murders are poping up just like his. Serial Killer returns to house to kill girls. Mute boy sees it and tries to warn web cam girl. She doesnt believe him. Turns out the serial killer in jail is actually the father of the real serial killer still at large. Aside from little stupid things like the killer being extra slow, mishaps like Terremce Howard holding files then exiting room with no files, the guy getting his face cut up and all of a sudden he just stops making noise... Details that dont mix just throws me off. The acting was OK but the execution of the plot could've been better. Mute guy, the famous actors and the guy who gets his face cut up were good. Ive seen it twice so its not terrible!! Predictable but not that bad. I would love to see Queen in a real horror movie tho. I doubt she would sign up to do one where she dies first so it would be fun to watch.

The film builds the story using headlines. Henry Lee Bishop (Peter Fonda) is a convicted necrophiliac serial killer. There is a copy cat killer. The story of the killings awkwardly unfolds after the fact as Detective Starks (Terrence Howard) is questioning Bishop about the copycat killings.Bishop's old house is owned by "House of Bodies" an Internet web site that specializes in recreating the killings as snuff porn for paying customers. The film subplots on Kelli (Alexz Johnson) a shy college girl who needs cash, but hasn't come to terms with nudity. She meets Kyle (Harry Zittel) on line, a shy mute.Once the first clue hit the table, the film lost its mystery appeal as a who dun it. In fact I didn't care, I just wanted to see Kelli after all the tease and hype. The production had the makings of a good plot, but ruined it by making a boring film. They could have left out the interrogation and just made it a copy cat killing with less camera shy girls.Parental Guide: F-bombs. No real sex. Rear and photo nudity.

First of all how does a movie like this manage to get a cast like this? It boggles the mind that these actors would actually be willing to take part in such a shit show, but they did, and it was an epic disaster. Inside a house once owned by a serial killer, college girls looking for money, live, on camera 24/7, in a place where anything can happen. Ya see, they are actually part of a fetish porn website, where they can become victims at anytime and people pay big money to see this. Unbeknownst to them, the serial killer isn't dead, and one night he returns to the house, where the killings become all too real and are streamed live on the web for the whole world to see. Plain and simple this is a mildly pornographic slasher film and a bad one at that. Some big names have some small roles that are honestly beneath them, and not at all worthy of their time. Not only is the story badly written, but the film is just frustrating to watch, as it keeps switching back between the actual house and the poor quality web feed people around the world are watching. The bottom line here, there is a great cast, a title and even a preview that will attract every horror fan that sees it, but if you get sucked in, you will be highly disappointed.

Terrence Howard and Peter Fonda's scenes in the movie is basically one very long interrogation scene split up to parts.A fairly pointless one may I add as well, where Terrence Howard plays a cop who's interrogating a serial killer played by Peter Fonda about a copycat of his.It's obvious that all their scenes where shot on the same day in the same location, and that they both did it for the money, and that the producers needed some stars in the movie to attract viewers, and that's the sole reason why they are in the movie.They aren't bad per se, but if they weren't famous their scenes would have been cut down to a couple minutes, or cut out entirely, hell they'd probably wouldn't have been filmed in the first place to be honest.The rest of the movie is about the 'House Of Bodies' which is not a haunted place even if that's what it sounds like but a website with 'web-cam-girls' in a apartment complex re-enact murders.It's really slow, and riddled with plot-holes, and the only reason I didn't absolutely hate it was because one of the web-cam-girls forms a friendship with one of her clients who happen to be a mute.But yeah the rest of the movie is a tiring peace of work, with overall annoying characters and pointless scenes of people clicking on websites etc etc.Queen Latifah steps by in a web-chat as a counselor or something to the mute young man, but that's about it.