The theatrical trailer for Open House appeared on the Blu-ray disc before the feature actually began, and at first glance, Open House epitomized everything I hate about modern day “horror” films. I am sickened by filmmakers who sexualize violence, those who want audiences to drool and get off to beautiful people begging for their lives like the victims in the Hostel series or other torture porns. I thought that I would be suffering through a knock-off of Hostel/Hostel 2/Human Centipede when I reached into my refrigerator for another beer, but I was wrong. Open House is not torture porn. If it was torture porn, then it would at least be somewhat interesting, if sickeningly so. Instead, Open House is a shell of a movie with nothing to offer in story, performances, or special effects. In fact, I would go so far as to say that Open House has nothing to offer a moviegoer who has a brain or a shred of common sense.
(Warning: Spoilers ahead)
Open House follows Alice (Rachel Blanchard) who is trying to sell her house after a painful divorce from ex-husband Josh (Stephen Moyer of True Blood), who still stops by from time to time to fix Alice’s hot tub. During an open house showing, someone sneaks into Alice’s basement and begins killing off people indiscriminately. The killers are Lila (Tricia Helfer of Battlestar Galactica) and David (Brian Geraghty). Lila seduces and murders her victims while David awkwardly videotapes them.
For some reason, David keeps Alice alive in a wall vent in the basement and looks after her much like a toddler cares for a frog he caught in the backyard. He might as well have stuck her in a shoebox, only taking her out to shove more lettuce down her throat. (Frogs like lettuce, right?) When Lila leaves for the day, David chains Alice to the kitchen table and threatens her with the kitchen knife every time she tries to escape. I think the filmmaker was trying to make David more human and likable to the audience, but all I could think about was whether Brian Geraghty had ever been in a production of The Sound of Music. With his uniform-like white shirts, Ken Doll-solid blonde hair, and Aryan blue eyes, I thought he would make the perfect Rolf. Heck, all he needed was a swastika arm band and he would have been the very model of a modern major Nazi youth.
There really is not any plot here beyond what I just laid out, but even with such a simple formulaic slasher story, the movie often struggled with basic storytelling techniques. The script kills off characters before the audience has a chance to get to know them or care for them. Anna Paquin, despite getting top billing and her face on the front cover, is on-screen for only a few minutes before her character is killed off in the lamest possible manner. David could have chased Paquin around before she met a bloody end, but instead, Alice finds Paquin lying on the floor with her throat slit. Thanks to X-Men and True Blood, Paquin is a star. How bad is this movie that they couldn’t manage to kill off Anna Paquin in a frightening or even remotely interesting way?
Some of the biggest problems with Open House might have started with the story, but I have to lay blame on the editing as well. Sometimes I had to rewind because the editing did not make it clear whether a scene had transitioned to later that same day or onto the next day. Scene continuity also seemed to be a struggle. In one scene, David was using a video camera, and the editor cut back to show the camera’s time code several times. The problem was that the time code jumped forward and backward. Such an obvious mistake is the true sign of an amateur filmmaker.
Open House was directed and written by first-time director (and first-time writer) Andrew Paquin, Anna Paquin’s brother. He called in a lot of favors on his first film including getting his sister and her fiancé Stephen Moyer to fill in a few minor roles. He tried to fool True Blood fans who he hoped would happen upon this movie at the video store, see Anna and Stephen’s faces plastered on the front cover, and believe that they actually were real characters in this movie instead of pretty pieces of meat.
After fully experiencing Andrew Paquin’s first venture into writing and directing, I only have one thing to say to him: "Andrew, I’m not sure if you went to film school or have ever watched a good slasher film before, but until you have done either, please don’t make any more movies."
DVD Bonus Features
Special features include audio commentary by director Andrew Paquin and Brian Geraghty, three deleted scenes, and the film’s theatrical trailer. The deleted scenes were pretty pointless, and none of the special features made me like this movie or think that it should have been made in the first place. I hope that Andrew Paquin sees that a bad movie is just as bad of a movie, no matter how many special features it has or if it is on Blu-ray or DVD.
"Open House" is on sale August 3, 2010 and is rated R. Drama, Horror, Thriller. Written and directed by Andrew Paquin. Starring Anna Paquin, Brian Geraghty, Rachel Blanchard, Stephen Moyer, Tricia Helfer.
