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A Paris Hilton meltdown
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Posted on May 09 2005
House of Wax; 1:45; R, for horror violence, sexual content, and language; Grade: C-
The press material for House of Wax calls the movie a “re-imaging” of the Vincent Price classic, and the filmmakers acknowledge that the new version is intended to be a new twist on the slasher films of the 70s and 80s. Indeed, it is just that. House of Wax bears nothing in common with the popular horror films of the last few years. There is no surprise ending; no mystery; no serious attempts at acting, or piecing together anything that resembles a story.
This is a throwback to a different era, to a time when Jason Vorhees ruled the multiplex, and the whole point of a horror film was to see how many different gruesome ways a psycho killer could dismember his victims. This is the kind of movie in which the stars, most of whom die, are all young and hot, and in which a little hanky panky is a sure path to a quick but painful death.
The one thing the producers got wrong in their press material, though, was the assertion that this movie offers a new twist on an old genre. Actually, it is exactly what one would expect. It is a slasher flick.
In House of Wax, Paris Hilton, along with a handful of other unaccomplished but beautiful actors, stumbles upon a small creepy town in the middle of the woods while taking a detour through the forest. Then they die.
Not too surprisingly, House of Wax doesn’t have much in the way of acting, and the script is moronic at best. Paris Hilton, looking as wretchedly anorexic as ever, could very well be the first person cast in a movie not for their acting talents, but because so many people would like to see her die a horrible death (she does).
Judging it by the standards of its genre, though, House of Wax isn’t extremely bad. It has a very slow start, but once it finally gets going, it offers some very tense thrills, and a healthy helping of uneasiness. It is also one of the more graphically disturbing horror movies of recent memory. Those are just the reasons people watch this kind of movie, so I suppose, in that respect, it’s really not a failure.
