Member Blog Post

Mad and madder today, as in "angry" and  "insane", but who's counting. 

House at the End of the Street is a great movie, marred only by a couple of things. One is a conceit, the other is more of an error, or  a cover which didn’t quite work.

The gun toward the climax holds 17 rounds, and is a semi-automatic, which does not go “click” when empty. It goes “click” in the movie after six rounds. This is all post production sound, so most likely it was just a decision made to cover for why she didn’t keep blasting and kill him (because we wouldn’t want to miss out on that other horror conceit, of course the killer’s not dead! “Surprise”! Not.). 

But burning off the fabric binding you to the chair with a light bulb? Some wattage. That one didn’t wash. It’s just stupid, bad writer-think. It’s the late night “idea”, and I know because I’ve had them, where you go “Hey, THAT’S how she can get out...” and no one double checks. Even on the set though, you would think the director would be un-brain-dead enough to fix that crap.

As earlier noted, and I guess this is number three of my nits to pick, the killer is shot three times and clocked in the temple with a hammer by an over protective mom, but somehow he’s still alive at the end. Which he has to be to give us the final bit of information, which does tie everything together, and unlike most flashback reveals, actually does work pretty well. 

All I ask is for the wounds to match the outcome, is that too much? And let’s get rid of:

the killer isn’t really dead “surprise!”;

people die from a three inch cut on their arm;

people live for hours with severed limbs and no medical treatment at all, and are fully conscious (i’m looking at you, Eli Roth);

figure out how many rounds are in the stupid gun and make the gun act accordingly.

Simple.

Also, if we hate guns so much, maybe we should have fewer in our movies, since we don’t even know what they do well enough to have them be empty after the correct number of rounds. No cop would have a Glock 17 with any less than a full mag plus probably one in the pipe for a total of 18, and I don’t really blame them. If the magazine holds 17, why would you load six? Even as a small town cop? You wouldn’t. Besides, you know there were meth heads around there in the past, a la the flashbacks, so you wouldn’t be taking any chances.

Seriously, even if you are a stupid writer or director, one Google search turns this stuff up.

Ironically, I’ve been shooting since I was 12, and have been a constant gun owner my whole adult life. No guns in my films to date. Go figure.

Max Theriot is a knockout, in all ways. This was a great movie, all bitching aside.

I also re-watched most of The Fields, which is just an amazing film as well, the other day. Cloris Leachman was inspired. I sat there again, slack jawed at her first few minutes on the screen. She is a genuine actress, and a wonderfully kind lady as well, from the few minutes I was privileged to spend with her years ago.

Anyhow, thought I would comment on two great films while I'm just feeling like a total fuck.