Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
5 stars is way too strong... but 3 stars is not enough..., February 18, 2006
I was pleasantly surprised by House of 9. As the movie begins, I saw the premise unfold and thought... what a great idea... sort of SAW 2 meets BATTLE ROYALE meets SURVIVOR.
Although more of a ripoff of SAW 2 (or maybe SAW 2 was a ripoff of House of 9? Not sure, maybe it was unintentional), HOUSE of 9 approaches the subject with fresh ideas and MORE REALISM. Where Saw 2 struggles to be commercial and come up with BIZARRE and MORE BIZARRE ways to kill people with the funky contraptions and riddles, HOUSE of 9 keeps it real.
As 9 unwitting people are snatched off the streets and wake up in a house that is sealed and unescapable, they are told that one person will be allowed to leave the house, and that person will be given $5 million... that one person is the soul survivor... meaning... the only way out... is for them to kill each other.
Where Saw 2 wastes no time getting into the depravity and murder and the thin assumption that a bunch of criminals will want to murder the son of the man who put them in prison, HOUSE of 9 keeps it real. It explores human nature and the unwillingness to comply and wait it out. How long would it take for a house full of strangers to actually want to kill each other? And how? there is one gun, with few bullets.
The mostly unknown cast, with the exception of Dennis Hopper and Kelly Brook, deliver well. As time goes by, the food is minimal, the personalities are clashing and tensions are building. Violence is coming and you can feel it, despite the members of the house's relucatance to participate in the sick game.
Unfortuntaley, the director relied to heavily on a couple of MTV montage moments that seemed to go on forever, the movie is actually a really good comment on human nature, madness, survival and what happens to a person when they've taken the life of another.
I'll admit... 4 stars... may, just may be a little too strong, and 5 stars is WAY TOO STRONG... but the movie was entertaining and better than most of the little straight to video movies that hit the video store shelves. I never once wished I was watching something else. I wanted to watch it unfold and see what was in store.
Not to mention, the ENDING was FANTASTIC! The ending... the final scene when the winner picks up their money... was the best part of the movie.
Rent it, watch it, I only recommend to buy if you're a big Kelly Brook fan. And who isn't?
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
You will get blindsided by the unexpected finish!, April 9, 2009
Speaking as a Kelly Brook fan and not as a movie critic I'm going to say thumbs down to this one.
Okay. I have to admit I was expecting/hoping to see Kelly in some sexy clothes and maybe a bikini or even a nude scene. There was none of the above.
This movie has a very thin plot. A bunch of people get locked into a house and resort to killing each other. There is a lot of "B movie" grade acting but I will admit I liked the surprise ending! Just when you think you know how it's going to end...Bam! You will get blindsided by the unexpected finish!
If you like B movie thrillers with at least one pretty girl then you should add this movie to your collection.
If you are fan of Kelly Brook you should check out Survival Island.
Survival Island
Survival Island is an adventure movie and Kelly is in a bikini showing off her nice legs and everything else for the entire film.
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
When are these annoying characters going to die, already?, June 20, 2007
House of 9 offers very little but a slightly new twist on an archetypal horror motif and some pretty incomprehensible casting. Dennis Hopper as a priest? I mean, come on, a priest? Hopper? Casting really dropped the ball all the way around on this one, I'm afraid. Hopper is probably the best actor of the whole bunch. They should have called this movie House of 9 Bad Actors, or House of 9 Characters You Desperately Want to See Die. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you actually have to slog through the entire first half of the movie to get to the first of the characters' eagerly-anticipated deaths. The first forty five minutes is basically these nine people moaning about their fate and verbally attacking one another.
So here's the premise. Nine individuals are randomly chosen to partake in a little contest, and by chosen I mean kidnapped, drugged, and deposited within the confines of a mysterious house. Once they all awaken and gather together, they learn that one of them will win five million dollars. There will be no consolation prizes for the losers, however, as they will all be dead. You see, in order to win, you have to outlive the other eight people in the house. So who are these lucky people chosen to take part in this deadly little game? Well, you have a priest (Hopper), a dancer, a criminal, a pro tennis player, a fashion designer, a cop, a composer and his wife, and a would-be rapper, each and every one a total stereotype, especially the rude, vulgar, selfish, cop-hating rapper (honestly, I'm surprised someone in the black community hasn't protested this film's racist characterization of the offensive rapper).
Once they're satisfied that there is no way out of this place, the group comes together and sort of decides not to play the madman's game, as he obviously wants them to turn on and kill one another. That spirit of mutual cooperation amongst suffering doesn't last long, of course. These characters are all so incredibly annoying, there's no way anyone could put up with them for long. You'll be ready to reach in and strangle every last one of them yourself long before they stop bickering and get down to the business of showing audiences the ugly side of human nature.
Once characters start dying (immediately after taking a quick break from their verbal sparring in order to bump and grind against one another to some really bad rap music), the movie finally finds a little traction in the blood that is spilled. The second death is a particularly brutal thing to watch. It's all downhill from that point, though, as the filmmakers dropped whatever pretense of character development there was and just had everyone start killing each other. It leads up to a fairly decent ending, but there was really no way for the film to recover from its disastrous first half.
Dennis Hopper does provide some unintentional entertainment, though. He plays what I assume is an Irish priest, but he has a habit of forgetting his fake accent - and when he does actually remember to use it, he sounds more like some Indian chief out of an old western than an Irishman. I guess I should mention the fact that all of these characters are European, so you've got accents flying all over the place in this one.
Definitely, those entering the House of 9 should beware of stereotypes, clichés, accents, and overused horror motifs. And don't go expecting a nice nude scene or two to help you over the rough patches, either. There were only two women in the film I would even want to imagine naked, and neither one comes close to revealing anything at all. It also bugs me that "the Watcher" can afford this big, escape-proof house and five million dollar payouts, but the cameras he has installed in every room are no better than the crappy security cameras you find in banks. All in all, I think I'm being pretty darn generous in giving this film three stars.
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