Boarding House
1983 – Paragon Home Video – Directed by: John Wintergate
Boy, I have no idea why I chose it – but I am seriously scraping the bottom of the video barrel this month for this el cheapo trash flick shot in “Horror Vision.” It’s called “Boarding House” and was also released as “Housegeist” to cash in on the “Poltergeist” trend. And what’s worse is I had a good time watching it!
OK… first off, this HorrorVision stuff is crummy! They show some black gloved hand clench a fist and a loud sound is heard that sounds like a bad synth effect. This means you should cover your eyes and ears cause “extreme Terror” is gonna be shown. I figure the whole movie should be viewed this way for ultimate pleasure… But hell, someone has to suffer so you don’t have to – and without delay, we get into the grit of this gravy!
The credits put you to sleep right away, so be sure to fast forward. Then there’s some lame early 80’s computer scrolling and a guy reading it. I have no idea what it is about as I fell asleep twice before the actual film got rolling. I figure it really isn’t important to the plot. I finally woke up when the actual movie started because the beeping of the computer stopped, breaking the hypnosis, only to find that my worst nightmare was only beginning!
Some old guy gets drowned at the beginning and some red paint fills the water, then suddenly it’s night and we get full moon shots in a CLEAR sky while thunder booms on the soundtrack. Some chick is doing dishes in a house and gets her hand caught in a garbage disposal. Massive sprayage ensues. Girl gets wild with dishes. Good stuff. Suddenly, we get more beeping computer crap.
Next we get bad acting from K-Mart employees and a guy who looks like Sting. Then some guy stares at a blood-filled hypodermic needle for a while and recites lines to it. Then some in-need-of-a-bag actress cannot take being in the film and commits suicide with her panty hose. A guy finds her and then we get that dumb ass HorrorVision warning and he goes ape and pulls some leftovers from a Bar-B-Que outta his shirt and acts all spastic.
Then we cut back to the house from earlier that looks really normal like one near my Grandma’s place. Sting goes in the house. He walks around and talks to himself and we get shots of people in a pool as he imagines them. There’s some bad garbonza shots of bad garbonzas that proves there oughta be a law about flashing such deadly body parts to a camera. Then Sting hears voices and thinks to himself while meditating in a goofy underwear outfit like he wore in Dune only skimpier and then he bugs out his eyes and moves pots around while we hear wild animal sounds on the soundtrack. Some dork knocks on the door and we are treated to Mr. Blockofwood actor, with a bad hat and clothes Oscar off of Odd Couple would NEVER touch. Then before we know it, a bunch of people show up at Sting’s house for a party or something. This part of the film roughly resembles Great Uncle Bart’s home movies, only darker and with less realism. Sting goes on and on about his love of bongos or something and people talk a whole lot. More talking here than in a week of CNN. And WHERE was my HorrorVision warning for THIS part? It was the part that scared me!
Pretty Soon, some twit gets a ice pick through her hand and blood splats a bit and then they bury the ice pick in the back yard (!) and go back inside. Not sure why. Except one of the girls falls in the pool on the way in and we get to see her in wet (see through) clothes, proving that things CAN get worse! Then they all talk in a kitchen for a minute and we are broken from our hypnotic talk stupor and we get a sudden shock as one of these talent-barren bimbettes takes a shower. It’s all suds and soap until She gets all ugly and next thing you know she’s wearing a bad Halloween mask and pulling dead rats out of it. Someone pours chocolate syrup on the walls in the shower and she gets all afraid of Nestles Quick and screams and her friend comes in and everything seems normal again.
Now, what we need to understand is that all the nekkid ugly people are very important to the plot! They contribute heavily to the overall disturbing nature and sleaze factor of this film, and besides, they are supplying the outright grossest moments in the film!
More pool hijinks follow, and a new girl, an Asian one who we will call Ming Chow, shows up. She likes Stings no talent friend and they start making like some bored bunny rabbits and then some girl that isn’t even in the movie gets in the shower. Then a guy gets attacked by a hair dryer and is electrocuted. The evil spirit of Conair was pissed because his hairdo looked like it came from Dairy Queen. Nobody hears this or notices he is dead. The box-of-rocks cast just keeps going through the same old routine of impersonating talking heads and trying to act at the same time.
Now we get close to the finale. Four girls get into bed together, like a slumber party and talk about something but I tried to tune it out. Just when we thought it was gonna be “Jammie Wrestin’ Night” at the Boarding house, we cut away… To a blond girl who gets nekkid and is in the pool where someone with a chainsaw comes after her. She just stands up and stares at the camera and we get bad close-ups on her eyes and mouth (nice mustache) and then it just fades to black for no reason.
When it fades back in, Sting is talking to his buddy with an Afro who wants to be Black Belt Jones but can’t, cause he has no talent. Just when you start to nod off from the banter…
We cut back into the house where the trio of tramps are looking for something (maybe a script?) under the bed. A hand shoots up through the bed for no reason and next thing we know the girl is in the woods running away from something only it’s lit with a bic lighter so nobody can tell what is going on, but I think she gets pulled into a grave by a bloody guy in a pig mask. I have no idea where the graves came from, but they must be near a cemetery with the bad taste to let these guys film there. Then she wakes up and it was a dream and she screams for 10 minutes. Her lame friends all talk to the camera and tell us it was “but a bad dream.” We should only be so lucky. Confused? Me too.
Back to the pool in the final act. Two girls wrestle around and we get more shocking nudity and even more shocking bad acting. Then some guys shows up to get one of the girls because he is engaged to her and “he wants her out of here!” I must agree with him at this point. Then one of the bimbettes gets mad at this and starts huffing and bugging out her eyes and she storms off to a bedroom and starts using mind-control and makes Sting spill wine on himself and the blond girl from earlier starts screaming because her friend starts pouring blood from everywhere and runs into the beach (!) where she bleeds more and is finally bloody and nekkid and she runs off into some waves. Then the bug eyed chick who went all “Carrie” plays with her stuffed animals and blood pours under the door.
Next thing Black Belt Jones shows up and so does some no talent band that had no idea what they were getting into, but they suck so bad that they deserve this movie! To prove this point, for no reason, the Black Belt Jones wanna-be guy pulls out a gun and shoots himself. I think either the bad band or the fact that he was in this movie made him do it. And they give you the HorrorVision warning AFTER he does it!
Then the singer for the band freaks and suddenly there’s blood all over her and she is holding her eyeballs in between her fingers and she falls at the camera three times and drops here eyes in some Malt-O-Meal that someone is making on the stove. Nobody hears her scream, but the blond girl suddenly looks like Lita Ford when she had the REAL bad hair in the 80’s and she is standing next to a fog machine with some colored lights, then we get the HorrorVision warning three times and she pulls some guy’s heart out – I think it’s his heart anyway – and Sting sees her and says “This isn’t right!” And bugs out his eyes and Lita Ford and Sting start fighting. Then someone turns off the camera and then turns it back on so the Lita wanna be “blinks” out like the witches on Bewitched, only you can tell real bad because the fog jumps too! Then Sting grabs a girl near him and hides her eyes. This is gonna be HUGE…. eh, not so much.
Suddenly, the action breaks and the computer thingie starts scrolling again with a five minute ending that I didn’t read. Then it’s finally over and I am still mad because that is 80 minutes of insanity that I still don’t understand but I actually kinda liked it.
Do yourself a favor – wait until you take some Nyquil before watching this one… or do so in a semi-conscious state. It might help! See ya next month – and I hope for both of us – I pick a better film!
5 / 6 / 2
Jedi Superstar Galaxy Of Trashola Classics 