DVD
Upcoming Release Calendar
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
Best / Worst of the Decade
Recent DVD/Video Releases
68
$9.99
49
2012
56
Adam
37
Amelia
35
Babysitters, The
86
Beaches of Agnes, The
19
Bitch Slap
65
Black Dynamite
71
Bliss
24
Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
47
Box, The
57
Boys Are Back, The
51
Breakfast with Scot
81
Bright Star
71
Bronson
61
Capitalism: A Love Story
57
Chelsea on the Rocks
43
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
65
Coco Before Chanel
69
Cold Souls
23
Couples Retreat
75
Crude
81
Damned United, The
54
Dare
61
Dead Snow
68
End of the Line, The
55
Endgame
47
Everybody's Fine
64
Examined Life
xx
Falling for Grace
31
Fix
74
Flame & Citron
xx
From Mexico with Love
28
Gentlemen Broncos
64
Gigante
50
Give Me Your Hand
72
Good Hair
73
House of the Devil, The
82
Hunger
17
I Hate Valentine's Day
26
I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
66
Informant!, The
34
Law Abiding Citizen
41
Little Ashes
33
Love Happens
67
Michael Jackson's This Is It
59
More Than a Game
34
Motherhood
49
New York, I Love You
19
Old Dogs
47
Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
68
Paris
44
Peter and Vandy
39
Planet 51
54
Pontypool
86
Ponyo
79
Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
49
Private Lives of Pippa Lee, The
84
Revanche
30
Saw VI
69
September Issue, The
79
Serious Man, A
36
Serious Moonlight
70
Shall We Kiss?
24
Sorority Row
76
Soul Power
40
Spiral
41
Splinterheads
39
St. Trinian's
33
Stepfather, The
50
Stoning of Soraya M., The
45
Surrogates
47
Time Traveler's Wife
65
Vicious Kind, The
69
We Live in Public
65
Wedding Song, The
71
Where the Wild Things Are
67
Whip It
43
Women in Trouble
73
Zombieland
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
House of the Devil, The
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 18 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 21 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Horror | Suspense/Thriller
Written by: Ti West
Directed by: Ti West
Release Date:
Theatrical: October 30, 2009
DVD: February 2, 2010
Running Time: 95 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: R for some bloody violence
Starring Jocelin Donahue, Greta Gerwig, Tom Noonan, Mary Woronov, AJ Bowen, and Dee Wallace
Sam is a pretty college sophomore, so desperate to earn some cash for a deposit on an apartment that she accepts a babysitting job even after she finds out there is no baby. Mr. and Mrs. Ulman are the older couple who lure Sam out to their creeky Victorian mansion deep in the woods, just in time for a total lunar eclipse. Megan is Sam’s best friend, who gives her a ride out to the house, and reluctantly leaves her there despite suspecting that something is amiss. Victor at first seems like just a creepy guy lurking around the house, but quickly makes it clear that Sam will end this night in a bloody fight for her life. (Magnolia Pictures)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
There's wit but never a wink in this smartly shot production, which pays homage to the 1980s without fetishizing the era.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray
If nothing else, Ti West’s retro “Satan rules!” thriller The House Of The Devil gets the look and tone of early-’80s horror schlock exactly right.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Andy Klein
The buildup is undeniably effective; for most of the movie, it provides the same kind of thrills as "Paranormal Activity," if somewhat less brilliantly.
Read Full Review >Time Out New York Keith Uhlich
West is far more adept at and interested in sustaining an unrelentingly ominous mood than in executing the genre-required spook shocks.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
A clever picture, and something of a novelty -- it's not going to change the face or direction of horror filmmaking in any drastic way. But it's fun to watch something that's so obviously made with love.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Mr. West shows a real gift for the genre, particularly in his ability to generate dread with pinpricks rather than bludgeoning shocks, something even veterans twice his age have difficulty achieving. After years of vivisectionist splatter, here is a horror movie with real shivers.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
This isn't just a good throwback satanic thriller - it looks as if it was made during the era of satanist paranoia.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
An almost fetishistic re-creation of a horror-suspense movie from around 1978.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
The film may provide an introduction for some audience members to the Hitchcockian definition of suspense: It's the anticipation, not the happening, that's the fun.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
In keeping with his models, West is concerned with not suspense exactly but the ritual withholding and ultimate lavishing of bloody chaos.
Read Full Review >Arizona Republic Bill Goodykoontz
Writer and director Ti West accesses all the hot buttons for fans of the genre in a manner that doesn't make fun of it (and its followers) in a "Scary Movie" way, but instead treats it with the appropriate amount of respect. (Key word: appropriate.)
Read Full Review >Village Voice Nick Pinkerton
Pumping the audience with inhale-exhale zooms and out-of-the-way close-ups, director Ti West's ratcheting of suspense in this alone-in-an-empty-house tale is proficient, if not psychologically piercing, in the best "Let's Scare Jessica to Death" fashion.
Read Full Review >Variety Peter Debruge
Call it the best '80s babysitter-in-peril movie never made. The House of the Devil delivers about as much as one could reasonably hope from the not-quite-alone-in-the-house category, with the bonus of authentically re-creating the low-budget look and feel of that era's classic horror entries.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
By far the freakiest and most unnerving shocker in theatres this season.
Read Full Review >New York Post Kyle Smith
Although the payoff is creepy, it takes a little too long to arrive -- and when it does, it's about as worn-out as the movie's title.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
This is the perfect illustration of the banality of most scare movies.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 5.2 (out of 10) based on 21 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
[Anonymous] gave it a1:
It seems this got high votes for presenting an 80's style movie. But that isn't enough to say it is good. Sure it was something different, but my friend felt that this was a ripoff of Tarantino style of homage to older style films. For me, I love slow brew suspense and horror movies, but this was just flat out dull and the similarities to Rosemary's Baby were disappointing. The only thing scary was that we actually sat through it. If it hadn't been a guy's night movie, none of us would have finished it.
zac h gave it a0:
The last 10 minutes are just horror cliches. Once the ritual took place i predicted exactly what would happen utterlly horrible no reedeming qualities what so ever.
Geoff McNulty gave it a9:
A nearly perfect attempt at making a slow-burning horror movie from the early 1980s. Hindsight is 20/20.
Tarek M. gave it a10:
Finally a correct homage to the 80's horror flicks without any stupid quotes or irony. Rock on Ti West!
J T gave it a6:
The plot for this film has been done a million times (or is it two million?). But the thing that gives it an edge is that the characters are smart & realistic, aspects which are usually tossed aside in 99% of other horror films.
Paul D gave it a9:
This movie is awesome. Rarely are horror movies crafted with such obvious care and attention. It relies on pacing and quality rather than in-your-face relentless violence or cliche shocks. One of the best horror movies of the decade.
Andrew K. gave it a9:
To those who have said the pay-off is not worth the build-up, I'd say maybe they're not approaching the film the right way. The build-up IS the pay-off. The fear and anticipation seething greater and greater (a fear and anticipation our heroine believes she is feeling naively) is what has the viewer on their seats edge despite what seemingly inane activites the heroine is performing. And, to me, when the climax finally does come, it doesn't seem ridiculous as it does surreal (we were warned from the beginning after all).
