A decent first-time effort…
As far as film ideas go, House of Good and Evil, is hardly an original concept, but what it lacks in originality, it more than makes up for in other areas. The performance by Rachel Marie Lewis was key to this films success, as the actress displayed every emotion imaginable with such ease and conviction, allowing us to pick up the feelings of her character, Maggie, through a full gamut of expressive facial features, which is to Lewis’ credit.
House of Good and Evil, tells the story of a couple who’ve just moved to a large house in the country to get a fresh start, after she loses her unborn child thanks to her alcoholic husband, Chris (Christian Oliver), hitting her, and now she’s no longer able to have children. The house is a large duplex that they only have access to one side of, until the old neighbors move out in a coupe of weeks. They’ve been told by the agent there’s been no phone lines there for years and cellphones have very little service (I bet you never saw that one coming).
- House of Good and Evil
- Directed by
David Mun - Cast
Rachel Marie Lewis, Christian Oliver, Marietta Marich - Release Date
1 October 2013 - Ed’s Grade: C+
Chris works for the forestry fire department and leaves Maggie alone for days at a time. While she’s alone she starts to hear a phone ringing through the wall, in the neighbor’s house, yet there’s supposedly no lines. Maggie starts to obsess over this and eventually makes contact with her elderly neighbor, Mrs. Anderson (Marietta Marich) and also meets the creepy husband, Mr. Anderson (Jordan Rhodes) who scares Maggie. There’s obviously something weird happening with her new neighbours but Chris won’t listen to her warnings. She’s taken to sleeping with an axe nearby and is slowly losing her mind. Is she really hearing a phone constantly ringing and are the neighbors as crazy as they appear to be? This is what we’re left to try to figure out.
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I think House of Good and Evil would have been better received a few years back, before all these other films of the same ilk had flooded the market, but apparently this film was planned a few years ago, when it would have definitely played better, and only delayed because of concerns of having a first-time director take the helm. David Mun has done a decent enough job with Blu de Golyer’s script and when you consider it was all put together for $150 thousand, you can appreciate the hard work that’s gone into the final production. Even with a story that we’ve seen many times before, the ending was, if nothing else, unexpected, but not everyone will be happy with the outcome.
Review by Ed Blackadder, Lead Entertainment Writer
