October Horror 2013: 6.5 - The People Under the Stairs

So I neglected to mention that Campfire Tales was not actually missed.  We hadn't gotten to it during the month itself but did watch it for kicks during the off-season and just forgot to update our spreadsheet.  So while we did watch it, we felt like we owed ourselves a new movie.

This has recently shown up on Netflix and I was urged to check it out if I liked bad horror.  There is, however, a difference between cheesy horror and bad horror. I kindof like cheesy or cheap horror, it can be endearing in its own way or try so hard it pops a vessel and becomes so-bad-it's-good.  There is also bad horror, which is just something somewhere going horribly wrong.

This is a 1991 Wes Craven movie starring Ving Rhames.  The story is about a black family living in a ghetto.  Faced with rent increases demanded by their landlords, The Robesons, and the mother's medical bills for cancer, they're unable to afford the apartment and are being evicted.  Leroy (Rhames), who I assume is a family friend or older brother or something, decides that they will organize a robbery of the Robeson's house for vengeance and cash monies.  The child, "Fool", played by Brandon Adams goes along.  After gaining access to the house everything goes south and Leroy and another friend called Spenser are killed.

My number one problem with this movie is tone.  Namely that no one seems to be able to agree on what genre of film they're acting in.  The male Robeson (just called Daddy) plays his parts as an evil and psychotic version of the robbers in Home Alone, while the female Robeson (Mommy) seems to think she's in some sort of live-action Disney venture.  She plays the "exasperated rage" thing so many live Disney villains do where they go cross-eyed and steam comes out their ears.  Fool's read is somewhere between straight and actually thinking he's in Home Alone and making cracks.  It's all over the place.  This is supposed to make the action mad-cap, but it just feels confused like no one is getting any direction.  The action also seems like the director/editor envisioned cutting Benny Hill music over half of it and freaking Mortal Kombat over the other.  Also, why would you want mad-cap action in a movie about feral children living in the walls of a house?

It's all just disjointed and retarded.  Not worth the effort.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled program.
--PXA