4.5
Dave White Profile <h3>Dave White</h3> <p><strong>Your Movies.com Man at the Multiplex</strong></p> <br /> <p>Dave White's first movie review was of the animated feature Snoopy Come Home. He was seven years old...<a href="http://www.movies.com/movie-reviews/dave-white">Read full profile</a></p>
Satan: still terrifying, it turns out. Read full review
Jen Yamato Profile <h3>Jen Yamato</h3> <p><strong>A movie fiend on a mission</strong></p> <br /> <p>Jen Yamato is a walking, popcorn-eating contradiction: she loves all kinds of cinema, from art films to schlocky B-movies...<a href="http://www.movies.com/movie-reviews/jen-yamato">Read full profile</a></p>
Scarier than legwarmers and acid-washed jeans! Read full review
Critics scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more favorable reviews.
out of 100
Metascore®Generally favorable reviewsbased on a weighted average of allcritic review scores.
This is the perfect illustration of the banality of most scare movies.
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The result can be palpably unnerving.
Call it the best '80s babysitter-in-peril movie never made. The House of the Devil delivers about as much as one could reasonably hope from the not-quite-alone-in-the-house category, with the bonus of authentically re-creating the low-budget look and feel of that era's classic horror entries.
The film may provide an introduction for some audience members to the Hitchcockian definition of suspense: It's the anticipation, not the happening, that's the fun.
The buildup is undeniably effective; for most of the movie, it provides the same kind of thrills as "Paranormal Activity," if somewhat less brilliantly.
Mr. West shows a real gift for the genre, particularly in his ability to generate dread with pinpricks rather than bludgeoning shocks, something even veterans twice his age have difficulty achieving. After years of vivisectionist splatter, here is a horror movie with real shivers.
There's wit but never a wink in this smartly shot production, which pays homage to the 1980s without fetishizing the era.
It is a fine little old-school thriller.
See all The House of the Devil reviews at Metacritic.com