House of 1000 Corpses

Though it’s a technically amateurish knock-off of the first Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), House of 1000 Corpses is entertaining and made with love (that is, love for filth, violence, blood and sadism). With it’s humorous tone, this nihilistic redneck rampage is sufficiently light-hearted to not be branded as perversely deviant or in any way taken seriously and thus “horrify” the viewer. (17/10/2020)

Zombie is well-versed in the 1970s and, bucking the recent trend of uniform slasher films prefers no-holds-barred exploitation with a solid psycho-American backwoods atmosphere embodied by the Firefly family. The ending is absolutely hellish and will not let you sleep peacefully. Admittedly, if I hadn't had my mp3 player filled with Zombie’s music lately and if hadn’t already seen a few films from the genre, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed it as much. It takes a bit of perversion and a bit of benevolence. It's a crazy horror film and I can understand Universal's initial motives. 4 ½. (02/12/2007)

I never thought I'd stick up for a man who voluntarily changed his last name to Zombie, but I couldn't help it. This distinctive director knows exactly what he wants to achieve, and thanks to the artful combination of clichés and a novel, frantically (not chaotically) edited visual form, he succeeds in it. The story of a crazy and, in its own very perverse way, likeable maniacal family does not stand out either for its brutality, which is rather subtle and cleverly hinted at, or for its atmosphere of moral depravity and sheer evil, which is tempered by a rush of brutal black humour, but it is, in short, an imaginative and murderously straightforward horror ride that never ceases to entertain and amaze with Zombie's insatiable, ruthless and, by the end, downright harrowing approach. Moreover, the film is peppered with references to genre hits that I enjoyed finding, and its finale in the underground, which also pays homage to Kubrick's The Shining (if my eyes weren't deceiving me), is very impressive given its depiction of unadulterated horror. Impressive, excellent....! Please more films like this, the need for them in the fading slasher and hixploitation sector is becoming more and more acute... 75% (10/11/2015)