The House of the Devil
Encyclopedia
The House of the Devil is a 2009 horror film
written, directed, and edited by Ti West
, starring Jocelin Donahue
, Tom Noonan
, and Mary Woronov
. It combines elements of both the slasher film
and haunted house
subgenres while using the "satanic panic" of the 1980s as a central plot element. The film attempts to recreate the 1970s and 1980s
style of horror films, using filming techniques and technology similar to those used in that era.
The film's opening text claims that it is based upon true events, a technique used in horror films of the late 1970s and early 1980s such as The Amityville Horror
and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
(for these films, this was often later proven false or only partially true). However, what actual events it is purportedly based on are not mentioned in the film or in any press releases.
) as she looks at an apartment. She cannot afford the security deposit, but the landlady agrees to accept the first month's rent instead. Samantha needs the apartment because her roommate is a slob who frequently has sex with her boyfriend all night long. When she sees a flyer advertising a babysitting job, Samantha calls the number and leaves a voice mail. The pay phone rings after she has hung up, and Mr. Ulman (Tom Noonan
) arranges to pick her up outside the Student Affairs office. However, he never shows up.
Ulman leaves a message with Samantha's roommate, and when Samantha calls him back, he apologizes for standing her up and offers her $100 to babysit that night. Seeing the money as the only way to afford her first month's rent, Samantha agrees, and her friend Megan (Greta Gerwig
) drives her to the house which is in the country. Megan is very skeptical, and begs Samantha to let her stay with her. When they get to the house, Ulman is very evasive when Megan asks him basic questions about who he is. He mentions the evening's lunar eclipse and how the town is the best place on Earth to see it. Eventually, he confesses that there is no child to babysit, only his mother. He agrees to pay Samantha $400, stressing that it was very important to have a sitter for the night.
Megan is furious with Samantha for agreeing to stay. She does not trust Ulman, especially once he admitted to lying. As she drives away, she is so flustered that she pulls over to light a cigarette. A man (A. J. Bowen
) appears out of nowhere to offer her a light, visibly frightening her. After she lights up, she asks where he came from. He asks, "You're not the babysitter?" Then, he shoots her in the head, picking the lit cigarette from her fingers and finishing it.
Back at the house, Ulman promises that his mother is independent enough that Samantha might never even see her, and he mentions twice that there is a phone number on the fridge for a pizza place. Ulman leaves with his wife (Mary Woronov
). Alone, Samantha spends some time going through the many rooms of the house. She decides not to enter one of the rooms, which is shown to have three dead bodies inside. She orders a pizza and plays pool. Eventually, she finds old photographs of the house showing a different family posing in front of it. The discovery unsettles her so much that when the pizza arrives, she throws the money at the delivery man and slams the door. The delivery man is the same stranger who killed Megan.
After a few bites of the pizza, she throws it out and tries to wash the taste out of her mouth. At the sink, she hears someone else running a tap somewhere in the house. She goes upstairs to investigate, ending up in the attic, where she becomes frightened by the sounds of someone behind a door. The pizza has been drugged, and Samantha passes out. When she wakes up, she is tied to a satanic altar in the basement. The Ulmans and the stranger are dressed in hooded cloaks, as well as a deformed priestess. The priestess draws a pentagram on Samantha's belly with blood and then pours more blood down her mouth. Samantha manages to free herself, stabbing Mr. Ulman and poking the stranger in the eye. She runs up stairs and trips over Megan's body in the kitchen. The stranger chases her up to the second story of the house where he shoots her in the arm. As he prepares to finish her off, she slashes his throat and flees into the attic. Mrs. Ulman appears devastated by the death of the man, and enters the attic. She tells that Samantha that it is too late to do anything, threatening that "it will work in spite of you". Samantha stabs her in the back as she prays for help.
Samantha dials 911, but when the operator answers, she has another, more powerful hallucination of the demonic looking priestess. Terrified, Samantha flees the house, followed by Mr. Ulman who is bleeding profusely. When he catches up to her, she points the gun at him, and he encourages her to shoot him. He explains that he is simply a messenger for someone else. He asks Samantha to listen to the voices in her head and realize that there is no way to fight them. Samantha shoots herself instead.
The film ends in a hospital room, where Samantha is recovering. A nurse tends to her and says, "Don't worry, you're gonna be just fine." Then, laying a hand on Samantha's stomach, she adds, "Both of you."
, USA. Taking place in the 1980s, the film was made with 16mm film, giving it a retro
stylistic look that matched the decade. Similarly, some aspects of the culture of the 1980s (i.e. feathered hair
, Samantha's 1980 Sony Walkman
, The Fixx
's 1983 song "One Thing Leads to Another
", and the Volvo 700 series
station wagon) are seen in the film as signifiers of the decade. The cinematography of the film also reflects the methods used by directors of the time. For instance, West often has the camera zoom in on characters (rather than dolly in
as is now common in film), a technique that was often used in horror films of the 1970s and continued to be used into the 1980s. Other stylistic signifiers include opening credits
(which became less common in films in the decades after the 1980s) in yellow font accompanied by freeze-frames
and the closing credits
being played over a still image of the final scene.
in New York City
on April 25. It was made available through video on demand
on October 1, 2009. The film was given a limited theatrical release
in the United States on October 30, 2009. The DVD and Blu-Ray of the film were released on February 2, 2010. A promotional copy of the film was released on VHS
in a clamshell box like the ones that many early VHS films of the 1980s came in.
composer Jeff Grace.
Tracks from 15 to 26 comprise the soundtrack for I Can See You.
based on 83 reviews; the site's reviews' consensus is "Though its underlying themes are familiar, House of the Devil effectively sheds the loud and gory cliches of contemporary horror to deliver a tense, slowly building throwback to the fright flicks of decades past." It has also received an overall score of 73 on Metacritic based on 12 reviews, indicating "Generally favorable reviews." Roger Ebert gave it 3 out of 4 stars, complimenting it as being "an introduction for some audience members to the Hitchcockian
definition of suspense." Kevin Sommerfield from Slasher Studios gave the film four out of four stars commenting that the film is "not just a nostalgia piece for director Ti West, one of the best horror directors working today, this is how horror movies SHOULD be made". Oliver Smith of 7films said "as the great horror films of past days, such as The Omen
or Rosemary’s Baby, The House of the Devil
is a slow-burning horror film, taking its time to introduce the characters".
The film won a few awards shortly after its release. It won the 2009 Birmingham Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival award for Best Feature Film. At the 2009 Screamfest it won festival trophies for Best Actress (Jocelin Donahue) and Best Score (Jeff Grace).
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
written, directed, and edited by Ti West
Ti West
Ti West is an American film director, best known for his work in horror films.- Early life:West was born in Wilmington, Delaware. He was featured in a 2001 Fall issue of Teen People Magazine...
, starring Jocelin Donahue
Jocelin Donahue
Jocelin Donahue is an American actress and model. She is known for her lead roles in Ti West's horror film The House of the Devil and The Burrowers. In May 2011 she began filming "Live at The Foxes Den" in which plays the female lead, Kat, opposite Jackson Rathbone .In her modeling career she has...
, Tom Noonan
Tom Noonan
Tom Noonan is an American actor and film writer-director.-Early life:Noonan was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, the son of Rosaleen and Tom Noonan, who worked as a dentist and jazz musician respectively...
, and Mary Woronov
Mary Woronov
Mary Woronov is an American actress and writer. She is primarily known for her roles in independent and cult films. Woronov has appeared in over 80 movies, as well as numerous appearances in mainstream television series, such as Charlie's Angels and Knight Rider.-Early life:Woronov was born in the...
. It combines elements of both the slasher film
Slasher film
A slasher film is a type of horror film typically involving a psychopathic killer stalking and killing a sequence of victims in a graphically violent manner, often with a cutting tool such as a knife or axe...
and haunted house
Haunted house
A haunted house is a house or other building often perceived as being inhabited by disembodied spirits of the deceased who may have been former residents or were familiar with the property...
subgenres while using the "satanic panic" of the 1980s as a central plot element. The film attempts to recreate the 1970s and 1980s
1980s
File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...
style of horror films, using filming techniques and technology similar to those used in that era.
The film's opening text claims that it is based upon true events, a technique used in horror films of the late 1970s and early 1980s such as The Amityville Horror
The Amityville Horror (1979 film)
The Amityville Horror is a 1979 American horror film based on the bestselling 1977 novel of the same name by Jay Anson. It is the first movie in the Amityville Horror franchise....
and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a 1974 American independent horror film directed and produced by Tobe Hooper, who cowrote it with Kim Henkel. It stars Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Edwin Neal, Jim Siedow, and Gunnar Hansen, who respectively portray Sally Hardesty, Franklin Hardesty, the...
(for these films, this was often later proven false or only partially true). However, what actual events it is purportedly based on are not mentioned in the film or in any press releases.
Plot
The film opens on a voyeuristic shot of college student Samantha Hughes (Jocelin DonahueJocelin Donahue
Jocelin Donahue is an American actress and model. She is known for her lead roles in Ti West's horror film The House of the Devil and The Burrowers. In May 2011 she began filming "Live at The Foxes Den" in which plays the female lead, Kat, opposite Jackson Rathbone .In her modeling career she has...
) as she looks at an apartment. She cannot afford the security deposit, but the landlady agrees to accept the first month's rent instead. Samantha needs the apartment because her roommate is a slob who frequently has sex with her boyfriend all night long. When she sees a flyer advertising a babysitting job, Samantha calls the number and leaves a voice mail. The pay phone rings after she has hung up, and Mr. Ulman (Tom Noonan
Tom Noonan
Tom Noonan is an American actor and film writer-director.-Early life:Noonan was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, the son of Rosaleen and Tom Noonan, who worked as a dentist and jazz musician respectively...
) arranges to pick her up outside the Student Affairs office. However, he never shows up.
Ulman leaves a message with Samantha's roommate, and when Samantha calls him back, he apologizes for standing her up and offers her $100 to babysit that night. Seeing the money as the only way to afford her first month's rent, Samantha agrees, and her friend Megan (Greta Gerwig
Greta Gerwig
Greta Celeste Gerwig is an American actress and filmmaker. Gerwig first came to prominence through her association with the mumblecore film movement...
) drives her to the house which is in the country. Megan is very skeptical, and begs Samantha to let her stay with her. When they get to the house, Ulman is very evasive when Megan asks him basic questions about who he is. He mentions the evening's lunar eclipse and how the town is the best place on Earth to see it. Eventually, he confesses that there is no child to babysit, only his mother. He agrees to pay Samantha $400, stressing that it was very important to have a sitter for the night.
Megan is furious with Samantha for agreeing to stay. She does not trust Ulman, especially once he admitted to lying. As she drives away, she is so flustered that she pulls over to light a cigarette. A man (A. J. Bowen
A. J. Bowen
Uncle Alfred C. Bowen, Jr. , better known as A. J. Bowen, is an American stage and film actor who appeared as Lewis Denton in the film The Signal.-Movie career:...
) appears out of nowhere to offer her a light, visibly frightening her. After she lights up, she asks where he came from. He asks, "You're not the babysitter?" Then, he shoots her in the head, picking the lit cigarette from her fingers and finishing it.
Back at the house, Ulman promises that his mother is independent enough that Samantha might never even see her, and he mentions twice that there is a phone number on the fridge for a pizza place. Ulman leaves with his wife (Mary Woronov
Mary Woronov
Mary Woronov is an American actress and writer. She is primarily known for her roles in independent and cult films. Woronov has appeared in over 80 movies, as well as numerous appearances in mainstream television series, such as Charlie's Angels and Knight Rider.-Early life:Woronov was born in the...
). Alone, Samantha spends some time going through the many rooms of the house. She decides not to enter one of the rooms, which is shown to have three dead bodies inside. She orders a pizza and plays pool. Eventually, she finds old photographs of the house showing a different family posing in front of it. The discovery unsettles her so much that when the pizza arrives, she throws the money at the delivery man and slams the door. The delivery man is the same stranger who killed Megan.
After a few bites of the pizza, she throws it out and tries to wash the taste out of her mouth. At the sink, she hears someone else running a tap somewhere in the house. She goes upstairs to investigate, ending up in the attic, where she becomes frightened by the sounds of someone behind a door. The pizza has been drugged, and Samantha passes out. When she wakes up, she is tied to a satanic altar in the basement. The Ulmans and the stranger are dressed in hooded cloaks, as well as a deformed priestess. The priestess draws a pentagram on Samantha's belly with blood and then pours more blood down her mouth. Samantha manages to free herself, stabbing Mr. Ulman and poking the stranger in the eye. She runs up stairs and trips over Megan's body in the kitchen. The stranger chases her up to the second story of the house where he shoots her in the arm. As he prepares to finish her off, she slashes his throat and flees into the attic. Mrs. Ulman appears devastated by the death of the man, and enters the attic. She tells that Samantha that it is too late to do anything, threatening that "it will work in spite of you". Samantha stabs her in the back as she prays for help.
Samantha dials 911, but when the operator answers, she has another, more powerful hallucination of the demonic looking priestess. Terrified, Samantha flees the house, followed by Mr. Ulman who is bleeding profusely. When he catches up to her, she points the gun at him, and he encourages her to shoot him. He explains that he is simply a messenger for someone else. He asks Samantha to listen to the voices in her head and realize that there is no way to fight them. Samantha shoots herself instead.
The film ends in a hospital room, where Samantha is recovering. A nurse tends to her and says, "Don't worry, you're gonna be just fine." Then, laying a hand on Samantha's stomach, she adds, "Both of you."
Cast
- Jocelin DonahueJocelin DonahueJocelin Donahue is an American actress and model. She is known for her lead roles in Ti West's horror film The House of the Devil and The Burrowers. In May 2011 she began filming "Live at The Foxes Den" in which plays the female lead, Kat, opposite Jackson Rathbone .In her modeling career she has...
as Samantha Hughes - Tom NoonanTom NoonanTom Noonan is an American actor and film writer-director.-Early life:Noonan was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, the son of Rosaleen and Tom Noonan, who worked as a dentist and jazz musician respectively...
as Mr. Ulman - Mary WoronovMary WoronovMary Woronov is an American actress and writer. She is primarily known for her roles in independent and cult films. Woronov has appeared in over 80 movies, as well as numerous appearances in mainstream television series, such as Charlie's Angels and Knight Rider.-Early life:Woronov was born in the...
as Mrs. Ulman - Greta GerwigGreta GerwigGreta Celeste Gerwig is an American actress and filmmaker. Gerwig first came to prominence through her association with the mumblecore film movement...
as Megan - A. J. BowenA. J. BowenUncle Alfred C. Bowen, Jr. , better known as A. J. Bowen, is an American stage and film actor who appeared as Lewis Denton in the film The Signal.-Movie career:...
as Victor Ulman - Dee Wallace as Landlady
Production
The film was shot in ConnecticutConnecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
, USA. Taking place in the 1980s, the film was made with 16mm film, giving it a retro
Retro
Retro is a culturally outdated or aged style, trend, mode, or fashion, from the overall postmodern past, that has since that time become functionally or superficially the norm once again. The use of "retro" style iconography and imagery interjected into post-modern art, advertising, mass media, etc...
stylistic look that matched the decade. Similarly, some aspects of the culture of the 1980s (i.e. feathered hair
Feathered hair
Feathered hair was a hairstyle popular in the 1970s and the early 1980s with men and women. The hair was grown long on both sides , unlayered , with either a side or a centre parting...
, Samantha's 1980 Sony Walkman
Walkman
Walkman is a Sony brand tradename originally used for portable audio cassette, and now used to market Sony's portable audio and video players as well as a line of Sony Ericsson mobile phones...
, The Fixx
The Fixx
The Fixx is an English rock band formed in London in 1979. Their hits include "One Thing Leads to Another," "Red Skies," "Stand or Fall," "Saved by Zero," "Sign of Fire," "Are We Ourselves?," "Secret Separation," "Driven Out," "How Much Is Enough?," and "Deeper and Deeper," which was featured on...
's 1983 song "One Thing Leads to Another
One Thing Leads to Another
"One Thing Leads to Another" is a song by new wave rock group The Fixx, from their album Reach the Beach. "One Thing Leads to Another" is the group's best known song, and their most successful single, peaking at No. 4 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart in November 1983 and peaking at No. 2 on the US...
", and the Volvo 700 series
Volvo 700 series
The 760 was Volvo's attempt to cement a place in the prestige market, after building a reputation for being solid and safe rather than out-and-out luxurious cars. Jan Wilsgaard, head of Volvo's Design and Styling team, proposed over 50 new designs for the new car. It was introduced to the US in...
station wagon) are seen in the film as signifiers of the decade. The cinematography of the film also reflects the methods used by directors of the time. For instance, West often has the camera zoom in on characters (rather than dolly in
Tracking shot
In motion picture terminology, a tracking shot is a segment in which the camera is mounted on a camera dolly, a wheeled platform that is pushed on rails while the picture is being taken...
as is now common in film), a technique that was often used in horror films of the 1970s and continued to be used into the 1980s. Other stylistic signifiers include opening credits
Opening credits
In a motion picture, television program, or video game, the opening credits are shown at the very beginning and list the most important members of the production. They are now usually shown as text superimposed on a blank screen or static pictures, or sometimes on top of action in the show. There...
(which became less common in films in the decades after the 1980s) in yellow font accompanied by freeze-frames
Freeze frame shot
A freeze frame shot is used when one shot is printed in a single frame several times, in order to make an interesting illusion of a still photograph....
and the closing credits
Closing credits
Closing credits or end credits are added at the end of a motion picture, television program, or video game to list the cast and crew involved in the production. They usually appear as a list of names in small type, which either flip very quickly from page to page, or move smoothly across the...
being played over a still image of the final scene.
Release
The United States premiere was at the 2009 Tribeca Film FestivalTribeca Film Festival
The Tribeca Film Festival is a film festival founded in 2002 by Jane Rosenthal, Robert De Niro and Craig Hatkoff in a response to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the consequent loss of vitality in the TriBeCa neighborhood in Lower Manhattan.The mission of the festival...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
on April 25. It was made available through video on demand
Video on demand
Video on Demand or Audio and Video On Demand are systems which allow users to select and watch/listen to video or audio content on demand...
on October 1, 2009. The film was given a limited theatrical release
Limited release
Limited release is a term in the American motion picture industry for a motion picture that is playing in a select few theaters across the country ....
in the United States on October 30, 2009. The DVD and Blu-Ray of the film were released on February 2, 2010. A promotional copy of the film was released on VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
in a clamshell box like the ones that many early VHS films of the 1980s came in.
Soundtrack
The soundtrack for The House of the Devil was released in November 2009 as a Double Feature with the score of I Can See You, both by avant-gardeAvant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
composer Jeff Grace.
- Opening (1.10)
- Family Photos (2.24)
- The View Upstairs (1.45)
- Original Inhabitants (3.05)
- Meeting Mr. Ulman (1.12)
- Keep the Change (1.12)
- Footsteps (1.27)
- Mother (3.07)
- Chalice (0.51)
- On the Run (3.45)
- Lights Out (3.04)
- He's Calling You (1.50)
- The House of the Devil (5.49)
- Mrs. Ulman (2.04)
Tracks from 15 to 26 comprise the soundtrack for I Can See You.
Reception
The film has been met with mostly positive reviews, scoring 86% on Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
based on 83 reviews; the site's reviews' consensus is "Though its underlying themes are familiar, House of the Devil effectively sheds the loud and gory cliches of contemporary horror to deliver a tense, slowly building throwback to the fright flicks of decades past." It has also received an overall score of 73 on Metacritic based on 12 reviews, indicating "Generally favorable reviews." Roger Ebert gave it 3 out of 4 stars, complimenting it as being "an introduction for some audience members to the Hitchcockian
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...
definition of suspense." Kevin Sommerfield from Slasher Studios gave the film four out of four stars commenting that the film is "not just a nostalgia piece for director Ti West, one of the best horror directors working today, this is how horror movies SHOULD be made". Oliver Smith of 7films said "as the great horror films of past days, such as The Omen
The Omen
An original score for the film, including the movie's theme song Ave Satani, was composed by Jerry Goldsmith, for which he received the only Oscar of his long career. The score features a strong choral segment, with a foreboding Latin chant...
or Rosemary’s Baby, The House of the Devil
The House of the Devil
The House of the Devil is a 2009 horror film written, directed, and edited by Ti West, starring Jocelin Donahue, Tom Noonan, and Mary Woronov. It combines elements of both the slasher film and haunted house subgenres while using the "satanic panic" of the 1980s as a central plot element...
is a slow-burning horror film, taking its time to introduce the characters".
The film won a few awards shortly after its release. It won the 2009 Birmingham Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival award for Best Feature Film. At the 2009 Screamfest it won festival trophies for Best Actress (Jocelin Donahue) and Best Score (Jeff Grace).
External links
- http://blog.spout.com/2009/04/20/ti-west-interview-the-house-of-the-devil-tribeca-2009/Spout interview with director Ti WestTi WestTi West is an American film director, best known for his work in horror films.- Early life:West was born in Wilmington, Delaware. He was featured in a 2001 Fall issue of Teen People Magazine...
] - Interview with Ti West about The House of The Devil at ion magazine