House II: The Second Story (1987)

The new owner of a sinister house gets involved with reanimated corpses and demons searching for an ancient Aztec skull with magic powers.

Director:

Ethan Wiley

Writers:

Fred Dekker (inspired by an original story by), Ethan Wiley

Stars:

Arye Gross, Jonathan Stark, Royal Dano

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Arye Gross	...	Jesse
Jonathan Stark	...	Charlie
Royal Dano	...	Gramps
Bill Maher	...	John
John Ratzenberger	...	Bill
Lar Park-Lincoln	...	Kate (as Lar Park Lincoln)
Amy Yasbeck	...	Lana
Gregory Walcott	...	Sheriff
Dwier Brown	...	Clarence
Lenora May	...	Judith
Devin DeVasquez	...	Virgin (as Devin Devasquez)
Jayne Modean	...	Rochelle
Ronn Carroll	...	Deputy
Dean Cleverdon	...	Slim
Doug MacHugh	...	High Priest

Storyline

Jesse moves to his biological parents' house with his girlfriend Kate and soon he hosts his friend Charlie with his girlfriend. Jesse reads old documents and decides to go to the local cemetery with Charlie to unbury his grand grand grandfather to seek out an ancient powerful Aztec skull. They reanimate Gramps that soon befriends Jesse and Charlie. But demons cross gateways in the house to retrieve the magic skull and Jesse and Charlie need to go to other dimensions to retrieve the skull and keep Gramps alive.

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Plot Keywords:

halloween | skull | house | western spoof | eternal life | 

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Taglines:

It's getting weirder!

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Genres:

Comedy | Fantasy | Horror

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Certificate:

PG-13

Did You Know?

Trivia

Ethan Wiley had only two weeks to write the screenplay.

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Goofs

When Jesse is in the kitchen trying to get the skull from the bird's mouth, you can briefly see the puppeteer operating the bird in the lower right corner of the screen.

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Quotes

Bill: There it is. Looks like you've got some kind of alternate universe in there or something.

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Alternate Versions

The Swedish VHS release is cut in the scene where Slim gets his head blown off.

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Connections

Referenced in Brad & Jerrid: Brad and Jerrid Watch the Room (2010)

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Soundtracks

Happy Birthday
(uncredited)
Written by Patty S. Hill & Mildred J. Hill

User Reviews

A House for the Kids

Jesse and his girlfriend move into an old mansion that his parent died in 25 years ago. He starts to learn about his past through old books in the basement and learns of his great grandfather who was an adventure and found a crystal skull. Jesse decides that he is going to find the crystal skull with the help of his friend Charles, but he soon finds more than he bargained for.

House was a quirky horror comedy in the vain of Evil Dead, House 2 drops all the horror and bumps up the comedy and becomes more of a goofy kids movie in the vain of The Goonies. The monsters in this one are for the most part non-threatening cute puppets and such and the comedy is mostly bizarre (why does Charles have an uzi?, Why is the electrician an adventurer?) Nothing really makes sense, but the random nature makes it funny.

This film is also more of an adventure film in which the house opens up portals into other time periods which gives the film an overall episodic feel and keeps things a bit fresh and interesting.

The acting isn't very good, but in a film like this it doesn't need to be. The special effects are fairly good and I loved the cute monster puppets and stop motion effects.

House 2 is a stupid movie, I can't see fans of the first movie liking the second one to well. It has almost nothing in common with the first one, there are no returning characters and even the house is different. But I still kind of liked it, maybe even better than the first. This one is more for kids than adults, but if you like bizarre random humor, you might get a kick out of this.

** out of ****

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 August 1987 (USA)

Also Known As:

House II: The Unexpected

Filming Locations:

Mount St. Mary's College, Doheny Mansion - 10 Chester Pl, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$2,573,934, 30 August 1987

Gross USA:

$7,800,000

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$7,800,000

Company Credits

Production Co:

New World Pictures, Sean S. Cunningham Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Metrocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1