Chain Reaction

Olaf is Germany's sfx-wonder. And he is an amateur in making movies. He started with video-home-movie-horror-events with incredible sfx which looks like the best days of Lucio Fulcio or the Hellraiser movies. But script, directing actors and dialogs are not his profession. I know that he is thinking that directing is his profession, but that is not true...look his movies. This movie is also a small-big-budget-amateur-movie with on a high trash-level and a lot of unmeant comedy. But there is a lot of splatter and gore sfx on a high level. Jürgen Prochnow has a small part in this movie and the only reason for it is, that he want to give this movie a chance because of his name. The story and setting is always the same in a Ittenbach movie: the hell, the dead, maniacs, zombies, rednecks and some stupid heroes with some lame Tarantiono-dialogs.

A very professional movie from the former "ultra-gore" auteur (Premutos ,The burning moon)Olaf Ittenbach. Chain Reaction (aka House of Blood) is a professional, good looking 35 mm film, with car crashing, great makeup and gore FX but it lacks in entertainment value. I mean, its very boring and confusing. The plot is very hard to follow and the action scenes comes only in bits (when they come are cool with gore and blood, but its a very talkie movie, and the dialogs sucks. Premutos was a great low budget movie. Then Ittembach entered more mainstream. The "fromdusktilldawnesque" Legion of the Dead was pretty cool and entertaining, but stuff like this or Riverplay make me think if i will watch a new Ittembach movie. 4/10 for the good productions values only.

On my TV, the film begins with two criminals getting out of a bus with pink jumpsuits, not the traditional orange.This is a gore flick which should appeal to the young, over 10 and less than 25. Got to love gore. There is little true acting. I feel like yelling "Road trip!" Carnage in the forest. Typical plot. The movie is very unpredictable. However, if you are a blood and gore fan, this movie is for you. The movie could have been 15 minutes shorter, which might have helped it. The movie has lackluster plot, contains lackluster actors, lackluster acting, and is just a highly predictable, minimally entertaining movie. But you gotta love it for what it is -- just late night entertainment.

While driving on a lonely road a bus with dangerous inmates from Seattle, the driver crashes on a car driven by Dr. Douglas Madsen (Christopher Kriesa) and the three prisoners leaded by Arthur Palmer (Simon Newby) escape and execute the security guards. However, Arthur's brother Spence (Luca Maric) is shot, and the criminals decide to abduct Dr. Douglas to take care of Spence and walk to North in the direction of the Canadian border. They find an old cabin in the middle of the woods inhabited by a weird family that speaks ancient English and advises the group to leave the place while they can. The strangers transform in flesh-eater monsters and kill the criminals, but the local Alice (Martina Ittenbach) spares Dr. Douglas and saves his life. He is found by the police and he is interrogated by a police officer (Jürgen Prochnow) that does not believe on his words and he is sent to the prison in Seattle. While in a bus with dangerous inmates, the bus crashes on a car and the story repeats like in a déjà vu for Dr. Douglas and the criminals.

"House of Blood" is an extremely violent and gore, with scary and gruesome special effects. Unfortunately the acting is uneven, with good but also awful performances. The screenplay and the story are flawed, since what could be the possibility of another identical accident in the same lonely road in the same circumstances? But there are good points in the story and with improvements and better actors, this movie would have a great potential. I can not say that I hated or that this movie is totally bad, but the story indeed deserved improvements. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Casa de Sangue" ("House of Blood")

the only reason why I'm giving this movie a 4 out of 10 is because there are some really good car crash effects, and you have to admit that for a low budget movie the effects in it are pretty descent, but plot is not a strong on this one,story either and the performance of the actors is really really bad, no true feelings, lack of emotion, and a lot of w.t.f scenes, this is a pretty disposable film, there are a million of them, better played, more effects, better photography, not so absurd choreography, etc... but the weakest link in this film i have to say and agree with many of you guys, are the dialogues, they are not firm, they lack of credibility and overall its too long for a movie that crazy! see it...if you dare!