La mansión

This post-AMITYVILLE HORROR haunted house film directed by porn director Armand Weston occasionally delivers the goods, but is more-often-than-not lame, overpadded and a little cheesy.

Writer Lauren Cochran goes out to the country to try and get past her agoraphobia, but when she moves into a frighteningly familiar octagonal house, she finds that there's things to be afraid of inside as well! First off, I'm rather disappointed that the film didn't make the main character's agoraphobia more of a main plot point. The idea of an agoraphobe renting a haunted house, unable to leave because of crippling panic attacks but unable to stay because of haunting specters, would make for a pretty claustrophobic watch. Instead, Weston's script takes the plot in many different directions, implementing slasher elements, prostitute ghosts and a CHANGELING-like mystery unraveling.

Sometimes, it works; there are some actually pretty spooky scenes here and there, and the mystery moves deftly enough to keep you involved. There are also some really fun set-pieces involving sickles and high-rise rescues.

Unfortunately, the over-the-top acting and dialogue from most of the supporting characters ruins any atmosphere the film could've created (the writer's quippy boyfriend had me about ready to turn off the film 20 minutes in). The unraveling of the mystery reaches a silly, melodramatic conclusion. And I often found the sound design to be distractingly amateurish, a gripe I do not have very often. Overall, you could do a lot worse with '80s haunted-house flicks (HOUSE WHERE EVIL DWELLS, any AMITYVILLE film), but you could also do better (CHANGELING, SILENT SCREAM).

Fun fact: The octagonal house where the film was shot is still standing in New York state and may be the only domed octagonal residence still in existence in the United States!

The Nesting (1981)

** (out of 4)

Writer Laura Cochran (Robin Groves) rents an old mansion from Colonel LeBrun (John Carradine) and soon realizes that there are some strange things going on inside it. It turns out that the mansion was used in WWII for prostitution and that many of them were brutally murdered and now their vengeful spirits are there. The 80s will always be remembered by horror fans for the countless slashers but if you look back at the early part of the decade you'll notice countless haunted house movies. This one here certainly isn't in the same league as THE SHINING or THE CHANGELING but for the first minutes it's actually pretty good but sadly it all falls apart. The first portion of the film actually managed to bring up a nice atmosphere, which led to a few creepy moments but these scenes quickly went out the window as the film started to movie into the second half. This is where the film really went off the tracks because they take everything from the house to the outside and we got some pretty stupid scenes and not any good ones. There are two weirdos on the outside bothering the writer and we get separate attack scenes and neither of them are very effective. I'm going to avoid spoiling anything but the second attack gets dragged out to a pretty long sequence, which just ends is a very silly fashion. Another problem with the film is that it runs way too long and simply doesn't have a strong enough of a story to keep the viewer interesting in what's going on. Groves offers up a good performance as the writer who is slowly losing her mind as does Michael David Lally and Christopher Loomis in his small role. Vet Carradine is always fun to watch but it looks like by 1981 people would know better than to rent a house from him. Oscar winner Gloria Grahame (THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL) makes a small appearance here in her final film. Another thing that kept bothering me throughout this film is wondering why the writer simply didn't leave the house. I mean, after countless deaths, attacks on your life and strange happenings, there really wasn't a reason for her to stay yet she just put up with all of this as if it was just a typical day. THE NESTING isn't a bad movie but at the same time it certainly needed a lot of work to be made better.

The Nesting is an open-ended supernatural thriller featuring a convincingly neurotic writer with a bad case of agoraphobia (among other things) who decides to rent a house she finds out in the country that looks suspiciously like the one featured on one of her book covers. At times the film is a reasonably intelligent thriller but it has a tendency to err on the side of goofiness. Many of the characters, despite being likable, are incredibly over the top (the Colonel, handyman Frank, etc) and quite often characters are brought into a scene solely to die because there aren't enough victims on-hand.

The film's ambiguity is largely owed to the fact that the ghost scenes only seem tooccur when the writer is nearby and the others seem to die right after the encounter. That and a later reference would almost suggest that the thing could have been in her head although the attacks look like they're being carried out by an invisible, supernatural assailant.

The writer's character is relatively dull, as are her two apparent romantic interests. Other characters are humorously colorful and bring a lot more to the production but the protagonist really seems to exist to do little other than unconvincingly act scared by various phenomena (oddly not done as well as the agoraphobia, but clever camera-work helped with that) and to unravel a mystery that never quite gets compelling.

Armand Weston's "The Nesting" (shot under the title "Phobia" but losing that monicker to John Huston's coterminous pic) is an effective tale of supernatural horror introing a most appealing actress, Robin Groves, as lead. Almost derailed by an overplayed psycho-amuck, pic resolves itself convincingly as an atmospheric haunted house thriller.

Groves stars as Lauren Cochran, an author of gothic novels, latest of which gives pic its "The Nesting" tag. Her intense phobia of leaving her New York townhouse is temporarily overcome when she moves to a spooky remote Victorian mansion.

Coming under the spell of ghosts inhabiting the mansion, a former brothel, Cochran's fears return. She becomes a gog in the ghosts' revenge upon their murderers, with the original massacre related in a slow motion "ballet of death" flashback executed in the style of Sam Peckinpah. By pic's end both the ghosts' vendetta and heroine's fears are exorcised.

Pic almost falls apart midway when Weston focuses on one of the murderers who maniacally goes after Cochran in an all too mundane "mad killer" fashion. He allows David Tabor as the psycho to mug outrageously in an embarrassing Rod Steiger imitation, and the film has a hard time recovering its credibility.

Aside from this lapse, pic is carried by the intense performance of Groves, who somewhat resembles the late British actress Rachel Roberts. Supporting cast, apart from Tabor, is okay, with John Carradine providing black humor and exposition, while Gloria Grahame unfortunately is waste in a bit as the brothel madam and lead ghost.

With this pic, helmer Weston makes the jump from hardcore porn to mainstream production, demonstrating a strong visual sense and narrative skill. Atmospheric film boasts excellent special effects, but the musical score is trite library music.

My review was written in April 1981 after a Times Square screening.

The main character goes from a seemingly likable character to very rude and pushy, which gets someone killed after her guilt-tripping pushiness puts them in a precarious position--literally. But what's her reaction? To start her pushiness up again and insisting someone else stick their neck out like the previous guy. Look, from our side, we see what she sees, but for her to instantly insist on the paranormal to doctors and scientists when she's clearly disturbed to begin with is hard to accept. Her going to an old, decrepit, poorly lit house to write and live when she's dealing with irrational mental issues likewise strains credulity. She also expects the man whose love she doesn't return to drop everything at a moment's notice to basically help her despite her insistence on being there in the first place. She came across as entitled and used to getting her way even when things made no sense.

The story poorly set up the conditions for her to be under in the first place. It would have made more sense if she'd come to live there because she had no choice, like maybe she'd been evicted and got the house as an inheritance and had nowhere else to live--something. And she stays in the house despite the hauntings when she clearly doesn't have to. The whole story is forced.

S/N: Her facial expressions when under stress and/or afraid are also unpleasant to look at, particularly centered around her mouth. I really don't mean to be rude, but I didn't like looking at her.