[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

The Horror Show (1989) ★★

Of the House films in the Arrow Video box set, this is the only one which doesn't feature any humour or levity, which is probably why the studios insisted on the title change.

With the film centring around a murderer killing from beyond the grave, it reminded me of Wes Craven's Shocker , The Exorcist III, and The Frighteners. Tonally, and some aspects of the narrative seem similar to Maniac Cop. It's not as accomplished or enjoyable as any of those films.

A major problem is the pacing – it's a ponderous film with long periods in which very little happens and the action, when it occurs, is not much of a reward for the wait. The main issue is with (pardon the pun) the execution because the tension is never maintained to the point where the violence is cathartic.

I wish there was more dark humour and fantasy, making this similar to the first House film because, as a 'straight' horror film, it seems an imaginative derivative.

House IV (1992) ★½

It's not a complete disaster, but it's not far off it. It takes a great deal of skill to balance comedy and horror so the film works as both and this isn't either.

I know the US healthcare system isn't overly generous to people on low incomes, but that doesn't quite explain why Laurel Cobb spends most of the film in a 19th-century wheelchair, nor why she appears to sleep on a feather-filled mattress.

The film lurches from goofy humour (a singing pizza) to psychological horror (a threatening message on a misted bathroom mirror) clumsily and, as mentioned above, neither scene is funny or scary. Unlike the first film in the series, at no point did the tone and feel remind me of Evil Dead 2, Shaun of the Dead or An American Werewolf in London.

The first three House films surpassed my expectations – this didn't.