Don't Go in the House (1979)

A disturbed young man who was burned as a child by his sadistic mother stalks women with a flamethrower.

Director:

Joseph Ellison

Writers:

Joe Masefield (story), Joseph Ellison (screenplay),

Stars:

Dan Grimaldi, Charles Bonet, Bill Ricci

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Dan Grimaldi	...	Donny Kohler
Charles Bonet	...	Ben (as Charlie Bonet)
Bill Ricci	...	Vito
Robert Osth	...	Bobby Tuttle
Dennis M. Hunter	...	Worker
John Hedberg	...	Worker
Ruth Dardick	...	Mrs. Kohler
Johanna Brushay	...	Kathy Jordan
Darcy Shean	...	Girl in Car
Mary Ann Chinn	...	Woman in Street (as Mary Ann Chin)
Lois Verkruepse	...	Woman with Kids
Susan Smith	...	Girl in Market
Jim Donnegan	...	Clerk
Claudia Folts	...	Body #1
Denise Woods	...	Body #2

Storyline

A slasher film about a victim of child abuse (Dan Grimaldi) who grows up to become a maniacal construction worker. He stalks women at discos, takes them home, then hangs them upside-down in a special steel-walled room and sets them on fire.

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Plot Keywords:

room | flamethrower | abuse | steel plated room | brunette | 

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Taglines:

You Have Been Warned!

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Genres:

Horror

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 March 1980 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Burning

Filming Locations:

Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$250,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Turbine Films Inc.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

82 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Dan Grimaldi kept the asbestos suit he wears in the movie.

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Goofs

There is no doorknob on the inside of the steel paneled room. As such, Donny would not have been able to get out of the steel room once the door latched closed.

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Connections

Referenced in Horror Business (2005)

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Soundtracks

"Dancin' Close to You"
Produced by Murri Barber
Composed by Ted Daryll
Performed by The Daryll/Barber Band

User Reviews

What? Creepy verstehen surrealism isn't enough??

First off, I don't like real life violence, but I like realistic violence in the appropriate media forms. That being stated, I appreciate the effort and crafting of any horror film that does good with what it has, which is what this film does exactly and which is the reason why I love it. But there is a part of me that cannot understand why they thought this movie was so bad. I mean sure, it has obvious signs of a low budget production, a little bit of a strong focus on a sub-theme layered somewhere in the movie and a bit of ambiguity, but everything else from the mundane spoken lines, the acting (especially with Mr.Grimaldi...hey, every big career has to start small) the synthesized music and disturbing imagery that you could rarely find in horror movies were memorably effective.

I can understand how some people just don't think it's scary in general and I'm not worried about that at all, but what confuses me is when people give it a bad grade for being 'sick' and 'perverse'. Were they just expecting some lame kill scenes like the kind we see today where we see the killer with weapon in hand, we see the victim scream and then we suddenly cut to camera two and they're magically dead? I particularly understand that some people are sensitive to such material and want to express being politically correct in their every day lives (apparently with the old movies they watch as well), but come on ladies and gentlemen!

This movie takes steps in a different direction! It pulls you into the life of a throughly traumatized man (hence verstehen = a walk in another person's shoes), it was made a few years after famous real-life serial killers such as Jeffery Dahmer, Ted Bundy and David 'Son of Sam' Berkowtiz were caught. All disturbed men who performed terrible acts of cruelty and murder due to the horrors of their personal traumatized lives, and you don't find it horrifying, scary, disturbing and/or unique to witness the fictional account of such a man who let his squelched mind wander too far on a positive gamut at all??

If you cannot deal with the aspects talked about in this movie then watch something else and don't complain about how sick a horror movie is. It's a HORROR movie to begin with, it's supposed to be that way! But if you are looking for a psychological horror movie that is uniquely creepy and different for a change (I'm really getting tired of that old 'EEEK', splat, ketchup-on-the-wall crap), and if you KNOW you can take the explicitness, then be my guest, hop on in, watch the movie and see what you think!