I love this movie so much

That was an excellent one.

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Two things you should know about Hell House right up front: first, it has no relation at all to the Richard Matheson classic horror novel as it's a documentary about a 'Hell House' (among many) that's run by Christian evangelicals. Second, it's not as frightening as Jesus Camp. That film had a much more stricter and crazier form of indoctrination in its focus of kids at a camp to become the next big evangelical leader. Hell House isn't quite like that, and in its own warped way is a little more humbling. The people who make the Hell Houses, as seen in George Ratliff's documentary, are pretty open about their intentions to scare and scar the bejesus out of anyone who walks in with graphic and precisely melodramatic scenes detailing incestual rape, drug addiction, homosexuality, AIDS by homosexuality, and usually with a demon-devil thing following around a character. The ultimate message is "Come Be Saved!", but that's not why so many non-evangelicals go there.They're not quite as uncommon as you might think, though it may depend on where you're situation in the USA (or, now happening, in other parts of the world). Certainly if one is near a big mega-church it's more likely, or in an area that is rabidly Christian (you know around whereabouts as it's the realm of people who talk-in-tongues, blabbering and gibberish meant to signify the Lord's presence through him/she/it). What's wonderful though in Ratliff's documentary is that he presents all of this without any strong bias; he's like a fly on the wall in the lead-up to a film or theater production, and the first thing I thought of during it was Waiting for Guffman, the mockumentary about a very- amateur theater group putting on a show.To be sure these actors they hire and the writers and producers are *very* amateur, but that's a big part of the curiosity and charm. We see some of the looniness that pervades the Church, the anti-Gay and super-strict tenets of their faith. But it's also about the creative process and seeing how it unfolds. It may be a little scary to see these freak-show scenes put together for the Christian Right's version of Halloween, and it's also a lot of fun. It's like a carnival, and there's a reason it's so huge among non-Super-Christians. That is, some anyway; the one scene where we see some dissent comes from a few kids who argue with one of the Hell-House producers about how offensive it all is. They're not wrong, though they should have known what they were getting into in the first place. The production of the Hell House, from its casting and rehearsals to the actual construction, is contrasted with a kind of sad story of one of the members/heads of the Hell-House organization with his family, one of whom has chronic seizures. It's sad, perhaps, that the kid is in the lot of life that he has, but also sadder still that the father puts God totally on call as the reason his son pulls through in one scene just because the ambulance doesn't show up quite right away. A story like this helps to humanize some of the people documented in the film, whether we'd like to have a cup of tea with them or not (which we probably wouldn't). Ratliff also has one-on-one shots with people who speak to the camera directly about what led them to where they are in the scope of the Church they're at, the pain that brought them to such a place. It's moving to see this, and I really respected the director's attempt to put a sympathetic light to these folks.This is not to say some of Hell House isn't silly, or a little strange or, yes, a bit offensive if, say, you have AIDS or might be gay or an actual victim of abuse or drug addiction. It trivializes them into a carnival atmosphere, but hey, you can buy the ticket and take the ride, or not. I'm reminded of the line from Training Day as the cop looks at the newspaper: "This is 90% bull***... but it's entertaining."

Yes, it was very accurate. I grew up in the church and this film is exactly how I remember my church years. I'm sure many are shocked and horrified at the actions and train of thought of the church, but I've been around it so long that I wasn't shocked at all by it. I think the reason why I didn't enjoy the movie is because it brought back a bunch of bad memories for me,but if I had never set a foot in a church before it likely would have fascinated me. With that said I was most intrigued by the fact that it seemed like these people were acting out their own fantasies. The guy whose wife left him was obviously writing out a fantasy in the scene he wrote where a woman is caught cheating and is then murdered was very disturbing because you could see some sort of sick wheels turning inside of his head while he watched the scene. overall, if you've never been to a church you'll enjoy it but if you've spent time in a church you'll likely just see it as the same old same old.

I was actually a volunteer for the haunted house version of Hell House and it is so sad to see so many people miss the real point of the movie. Actually, I can see in all of these comments that people don't WANT to see the point. The point is not to condemn a gay person to hell, or to say that a girl that gets raped is going to hell. The point is to say that if we don't turn to Jesus, we are ALL going to hell. Sorry if that word stings the conscience, but I can only assume that the amazingly bitter backlash for this movie shows peoples defensiveness about the subject, and lack of understanding of what the TRUE message of the bible is. Before another person makes a single comment about this being the work of Christian whack jobs, I would like you to refute ANY of the things in Hell House using the bible. Each of the things described are enough to send any of us to hell if we don't repent, or so the Bible says. If you're a Christian, you believe in the Bible, all of it. So don't say that this is Christian nut jobs. This applies to ALL Christians, this is our message, that Jesus loves you enough to save you from yourself.....to save you from Hell. I think the problem here is, that those who bitterly oppose it don't want to have to make that choice. The way is narrow people...and before you jump all over that statement....it's in the bible too.

Hell House was a peculiar experience for me. I bought the movie on DVD at a small record shop, since I found the summary on the back intriguing enough. I'm glad I have it in my library. It's something that I know I will pull out when I feel like seeing something balanced. I'm willing to admit that I'm predisposed to a position on this sort of subject, although that does not cloud my judgment of what is actually a very evenhanded approach to this subject matter. In fact, I think I found myself more likely to get bored since they clearly aren't picking the best or the worst of each person's dialog. Some of the things that the subjects say are completely reasonable. We're all just a little clouded by the way we've chosen to view the world.In fact, the only viewer who would be truly bored by this movie would one who is not at all interested in the subject matter. On the technical end of the review, most of the others here have claimed that this has been poorly shot and edited. The editing could use a little tweaking, and I'd like some subtitles when appropriate, but other than that, I found nothing truly lacking in technical aspects.