The Bleeding House Reviews

*1/2 out of ****

Philip Gelatt's "The Bleeding House" has aspirations to be creepy, thrilling, violent, and philosophical all at the same time. The director - who also served as screenwriter - seems to have Michael Hanake's "Funny Games" in mind when it comes to the concept he's dealing with; he wants to display brutalized and violent horror, but with a clear message that could either come off as meaningful or down-right hypocritical. Let's just say that if you didn't like Hanake's film - which obviously served as inspiration for Gelatt's - then you might actually find yourself enjoying "The Bleeding House". You'll end up in the exact opposite situation, however, if you reverse those two so that it turns out that you actually liked "Funny Games". Either way, I think it's pretty obvious which film you should appreciate more over the other.

In short, "The Bleeding House" just doesn't work. A few things here-and-there are decent, sure, but in a whole it's just not all that impressive. I've seen plenty of independent horror movies - some better and others worse than this. Still, I don't think that should act as an excuse for Gelatt's straightforward failure as both a director and a storyteller. He lacks a style - which is typical of first-time filmmakers in the independent field, but nonetheless unacceptable - and he also lacks a purpose. The movie he's made is essential a remake of all the films that influenced it; there's not much more to say as far as its main ideas go, and in a sense, I think the film is aware of this; because it's almost like Gelatt didn't make any attempts whatsoever to say something relatively new.

So we've got this traumatized family - father, mother, daughter (Alexandra Chando), and son - supposedly divided by a tragedy not too far in the past. The incident that left each of their individual lives and their accumulated family in pieces is illustrated early-on only through images of a burning house and talk of murder. Slowly, the film takes us through an afternoon into a night with this troubled family; with a dinner scene that seems to beg for our admiration in terms of its "atmosphere" and "unnerving" nature.

After dinner has been served, eaten, and ruined; the night is finally upon us, but things are about to get even less ordinary. As the son is exiting the home; he sees a peculiar and well-dressed man walking up to the house. This same man greets the father and eventually the mother, introduces himself as Nick (Patrick Breen) and is allowed entrance to the household. He will stay there for the night.

However, he seems to know that the family harbors some deep, dark secrets; and he's about to make their night, to state it as vaguely as possible. If you desire a description of the night to come that is, say, a little more...blunt; then perhaps I should mention the part where Nick starts knocking out the family members one-by-one and hooking them up to blood-absorbing machines that he had hidden inside the little briefcase that he carries in and out of the house.

That's as far as I'll go with the story. If you're interested, you won't want me to spoil the big secrets and revelations that come with the film; some of them may act as mild pleasures. You might even like this film; I know plenty of critics who were - much like me - very critical of the movie, while a few swam against the tides and pronounced their admiration for the feature. I've said it once before, perhaps in a different review for a different film, but I'll say it again; I support independent filmmaking all-the-way, and while I dislike "The Bleeding House" immensely due to the fact that I was simply unable to forgive it of its often massively distracting flaws, I would never tell anyone NOT to see it. Yeah, I don't recommend it in the slightest, but if you want to see it; then see it. Who knows? Your reaction might differ significantly from mine.

I like it when a filmmaker wants to go places where few filmmakers would dare explore for even a minute; but there's successful execution of a good idea, and then there's pretension. "The Bleeding House" really doesn't have a whole lot going for it; it's a slow, unrewarding experience with the aspirations of an art film. I don't think it ends up being one, though. It's just too typical; while it wants ever-so-much to be atypical. There are some high points - including some ominous shots of the house at night and the performance from Breen, which itself has its ups and downs - but they aren't enough to cover up the fact that "The Bleeding House" is a bloodbath undertaking the qualities of what could have been a thought-provoking and interesting horror-thriller. But Gelatt does no more - and no less - than bleed his admittedly ambitious idea completely dry; until it's reduced to a (very) cool poster and a few menacing visual tricks.

Regardless of what others are saying about this movie, I enjoyed it. It was subtle horror at its best. Some of the acting was bad yes, especially the girlfriend, but some of it was really good too. Gloria and Nick were good characters. Take some of the cliche things out and it would have been a lot better too. Cops showing up and then not believing the story and going to check things out only to get killed has been played to death.

As a reviewer below suggests, The Bleeding House bears many similarities to Michael Haneke's Funny Games except that it is never really disturbing or provocative. While it features solid acting and direction, The Bleeding House lacks genuinely creepy or unsettling moments, and ultimately just limps along toward its conclusion without any sense of horrific or philosophical payoff.

Not really a fan of this movie, it started off ok, and as a fan of Dexter I should have liked it. But unfortunately your hero here is worse than the villain. That being said, I really liked Patrick Breen as nick, he made the movie watchable.

A cut above, but even that isn't saying much.

Yes it was low budget and nobodies going home with an oscar after this, but I thought it was suspenseful and had me interested enough throughout. Great ending too.

Boring, far from thrilling, and uneventful. There was no excitment or suspense throughout the entire film. Where's the passion? This was stupid and a waste of time.

An interesting cult horror movie.
I am legitimately surprised that this movie has such a low rating. It was great to find a movie as dark as this. I would expect the ending of this movie (spoiler alert) to portray the young girl Blackbird as a new person entirely, I expected her to stop with her relentless, pointless killing and find a new direction in life. But I was happy to see that the story took a completely unexpected turn, concluding Blackbird's character as a sadistic killer. But the greatest part of this movie was the killer, with such creative motives and a great delivery of long, interesting speeches. Not a bad movie AT ALL! I'm convinced this will become popular one day as a cult classic. So happy to come across this.

An intriguing small budget indie that delivers some great tongue nâ(TM) cheek horror and lots and lots of weirdness. I was hesitant going in prejudging this to be just another run the mill cheap slasher flick. But as soon as the âcharming visitorâ? arrived on the scene I knew I was either seeing something good, or a very bad experiment movie. Either way, I just had to learn the agenda of this psycho in the white suit who spoke like a character out of a Tennessee Williams play. I also enjoyed the quiet strangeness and strong presence of adorable leading character âBlack Birdâ? played by Alexandra Chando. She barley spoke a line, but was absolutely wonderful to watch. âThe Bleedingâ? is an amusing slasher project with good special effects, original characters and lots of surprises.

The Bleeding House might easily fall prey to the big Hollywood remake machine. it's infuriating to think that it might... But it's easy to see some out of touch executive, still reeking from cigarette and prostitutes, finding the easiest way to circumvent the creative process and shuffling his evil little feet across the hall to postpone the devil from taking his bruised, blackened little soul for another fortnight... A quill pen gets dipped in arterial elixir and voila... Bradley Cooper gets cast in the overblown and unnecessary remake of The Bleeding House... AND... That is exactly how it happens... Unless the exec is a non smoker of course... Jus sayin. Bleeding House works well being a small movie. It uses it's scale as a means to keep the tension intimate and real. Compromise that and it surrenders it's tone and impact...which is the real crux of the picture. The film is heavy with atmosphere and although it surrenders some of it's mysteries a little too early, the film's pace and a great cast never has you looking at the clock or questioning it's motives. It's House's casting thats the standout element that really brings it all together too. A small cast that benefits greatly from a vaguely familiar face... Patrick Breen. Breen, a character actor with a multitude of tv and film credits, plays Nick, a mysterious visitor who shows up on the doorstep of the home of a troubled family. A family seemingly imprisoned by their own social alienation, they offer their house to the traveller for the night. Breen plays up the smug, yet charming Nick in the film's first act with a clever bravado that only intensifies over the course of the picture until he makes the movie his vehicle... And you'll have absolutely no issue with it either. This is the kid of performance that sees an actor of Breen's caliber suddenly offered a score of higher profile roles. We follow the family and their visitor through a night of murder, torture and revelations that leaves you glad you weren't aware of any of the film's reveals before going in. I won't dare give away the film's turns because this is how a movie like The Bleeding House functions best. Suffice it to say...This one is RECOMMENDED.

This movie was super creepy, but I loved the anticipation of what Alexandra Chando's Gloria would do.

2 stars for a cool performance but could have been so much better if it didn't get so off track half way through.

A strange romp to say the least...but this is why they have Holiday Inn Express... No strangers stay over...safer for them and the homeowner!

Wants to be a cross between the fine TV show "American Horror Story" and the Robert Mitchum classic "Night of the Hunter," "The Bleeding House" fails miserably. But, Patrick Breen's portrayal as a sinister southern surgeon is worthy of comparison with Robert Mitchum's legendary villain. Too bad, this movie's script and other performances lacks in clarity and substance. And, aren't we all tired of movies and TV shows that have cops show up at a crime scene and fail to call for back-up. This movie has that annoying flaw and several others. I would like to credit Hildur Guðnadóttir's music. It and Breen's performance are worthy of a better movie

I had nothing better to do with my Tuesday afternoon, so I figured I would sit down and give this movie a bit of a whirl. Within a couple of seconds I knew this would be a terrible and cheesy attempt at horror. Whilst not necessarily a bad film as a whole, the writing leaves much to be desired. The plot pacing is kind of sucky, there's little to no character development, and the only character that seemed truly alive was the Southern Gentleman (he was actually quite perfect, given how sinster he truly was). Not high on my list of recommendations.

Daaaaark. It's not perfect, but the engaging creepiness makes The Bleeding House a worthwhile watch.

Two sociopaths meet. One just blooming and one a seasoned professional. Some people get in the way, but it's an interesting dynamic and the dialogue is well about average. Worth the time.

*1/2 out of ****

Philip Gelatt's "The Bleeding House" has aspirations to be creepy, thrilling, violent, and philosophical all at the same time. The director - who also served as screenwriter - seems to have Michael Hanake's "Funny Games" in mind when it comes to the concept he's dealing with; he wants to display brutalized and violent horror, but with a clear message that could either come off as meaningful or down-right hypocritical. Let's just say that if you didn't like Hanake's film - which obviously served as inspiration for Gelatt's - then you might actually find yourself enjoying "The Bleeding House". You'll end up in the exact opposite situation, however, if you reverse those two so that it turns out that you actually liked "Funny Games". Either way, I think it's pretty obvious which film you should appreciate more over the other.

In short, "The Bleeding House" just doesn't work. A few things here-and-there are decent, sure, but in a whole it's just not all that impressive. I've seen plenty of independent horror movies - some better and others worse than this. Still, I don't think that should act as an excuse for Gelatt's straightforward failure as both a director and a storyteller. He lacks a style - which is typical of first-time filmmakers in the independent field, but nonetheless unacceptable - and he also lacks a purpose. The movie he's made is essential a remake of all the films that influenced it; there's not much more to say as far as its main ideas go, and in a sense, I think the film is aware of this; because it's almost like Gelatt didn't make any attempts whatsoever to say something relatively new.

So we've got this traumatized family - father, mother, daughter (Alexandra Chando), and son - supposedly divided by a tragedy not too far in the past. The incident that left each of their individual lives and their accumulated family in pieces is illustrated early-on only through images of a burning house and talk of murder. Slowly, the film takes us through an afternoon into a night with this troubled family; with a dinner scene that seems to beg for our admiration in terms of its "atmosphere" and "unnerving" nature.

After dinner has been served, eaten, and ruined; the night is finally upon us, but things are about to get even less ordinary. As the son is exiting the home; he sees a peculiar and well-dressed man walking up to the house. This same man greets the father and eventually the mother, introduces himself as Nick (Patrick Breen) and is allowed entrance to the household. He will stay there for the night.

However, he seems to know that the family harbors some deep, dark secrets; and he's about to make their night, to state it as vaguely as possible. If you desire a description of the night to come that is, say, a little more...blunt; then perhaps I should mention the part where Nick starts knocking out the family members one-by-one and hooking them up to blood-absorbing machines that he had hidden inside the little briefcase that he carries in and out of the house.

That's as far as I'll go with the story. If you're interested, you won't want me to spoil the big secrets and revelations that come with the film; some of them may act as mild pleasures. You might even like this film; I know plenty of critics who were - much like me - very critical of the movie, while a few swam against the tides and pronounced their admiration for the feature. I've said it once before, perhaps in a different review for a different film, but I'll say it again; I support independent filmmaking all-the-way, and while I dislike "The Bleeding House" immensely due to the fact that I was simply unable to forgive it of its often massively distracting flaws, I would never tell anyone NOT to see it. Yeah, I don't recommend it in the slightest, but if you want to see it; then see it. Who knows? Your reaction might differ significantly from mine.

I like it when a filmmaker wants to go places where few filmmakers would dare explore for even a minute; but there's successful execution of a good idea, and then there's pretension. "The Bleeding House" really doesn't have a whole lot going for it; it's a slow, unrewarding experience with the aspirations of an art film. I don't think it ends up being one, though. It's just too typical; while it wants ever-so-much to be atypical. There are some high points - including some ominous shots of the house at night and the performance from Breen, which itself has its ups and downs - but they aren't enough to cover up the fact that "The Bleeding House" is a bloodbath undertaking the qualities of what could have been a thought-provoking and interesting horror-thriller. But Gelatt does no more - and no less - than bleed his admittedly ambitious idea completely dry; until it's reduced to a (very) cool poster and a few menacing visual tricks.

Between the killer's tacked-on, over the top dialogue and the weird but uninteresting dynamic of the family, the film can get quite annoying fast... but it was still relentless enough to keep my attention throughout.

I looked and looked but I couldn't anything I didn't like about this! Really the only thing was the audio was a little hard to hear. But the plot was good and the acting was fabulous!