Dead Dudes in the House (1989)
AKA The Dead Come Home, Hexenhaus, The House on Tombstone Hill
Starring Mark Zobian, Victor Verhaeghe, Sarah Newhouse, Douglas Gibson, J.D. Cerna, Naomi Kooker, Eugene Sautner, Rob Moretti, James Griffin
Directed by James Riffel
Expectations: Moderate.
On the general scale:
On the B-movie scale:
Dead Dudes in the House was the title given to this film for its Troma release, and while it’s not the most fitting title for the actual film, its blunt force encapsulates the quickly escalating horror of the film very well. There is little time spent here for anything other than straight horror thrills and killers stalking dudes. As long as you’re OK with that, this is an outstanding film that will entertain B-Movie fans completely. Troma isn’t known for their quality films, but this one is great. And not “great for a Troma movie,” it’s just plain ol’ great.
The basic storyline is one horror fans will have seen hundreds of times: a bunch of friends venture out to a remote house that unbeknownst to them is home to evil spirits and their doom! In Dead Dudes in the House, the house has recently been purchased by one of the dudes, so he has brought a bunch of dudes to help him fix the place up. There is a clear delineation amongst the dudes, though. On one side we have the white-collar dudes (the new owner of the house, his sweater-wearin’ friends and their girlfriends) and on the other the blue-collar dudes who seem like hired help to do most of the dirty work. That’s what it seems like anyway, but there’s also moments where it seems like they’re all friends, so I don’t know.