Review: House of Wax (2005)

A bunch of dead-heads (Elisha Cuthbert, Chad Michael Murray, Jared Padalecki, Paris Hilton, Jon Abrahams, and Robert Ri’chard) get lost in the backroads of Baton Rouge. And then something happens to their car. A local hick (played quite well by Aussie character actor Damon Herriman- the film was shot over here) agrees to take Cuthbert and Padalecki to the nearest town, leaving the others behind. At this town they run into mechanic Brian Van Holt, who says he has the parts they need to fix their car. They also come across an old wax museum. And that’s when people start dying.

 

Although the idea of a house literally made of wax is a clever one in conception, this 2005 remake of the 1953 Vincent Price classic (or the 1933 “Mystery of the Wax Museum”, if you prefer) from first-time feature director Jaume Collett-Serra (Who went onto the OK “Orphan” and the enjoyable thriller “Unknown”) gets pretty much everything wrong. The 1953 film was macabre fun with a terrific ham special from Vincent Price, but this one’s a tedious slasher film featuring an underwhelming Brian Van Holt. Jesus, couldn’t they at least have gotten Geoffrey Rush (who had the Price role in the remake of “House on Haunted Hill”)? Jeffrey Combs? Tim Curry?

 

The 1953 film didn’t need a bunch of twenty-ish Jason Voorhees victims, and this film gives us a quartet of TV stars (Elisha Cuthbert, Chad Michael Murray, Jared Padalecki, and Jon Abrahams) and a celebutant, all of whom are now pretty much irrelevant in 2014, except maybe “Supernatural” star Padalecki. I don’t think I’ve seen Cuthbert in anything since about 2008, and Paris Hilton has only recently re-emerged from obscurity in 2014 because she and Kim Kardashian may or may not be cool with each other again. I really never got Paris Hilton. She looks like a deflated sex doll, or a Barbie doll with no boobs moulded yet. Or perhaps there was a tragic accident at Mattel where Barbie and Ken got blended together. As an actress she is hamstrung by an inexperience with any form of human emotion whatsoever. Anyone who has ever seen her interviewed knows exactly what I mean. Hilton is giving a guy a blowjob in the first ten minutes here, whilst poor Cuthbert had to dye her hair because apparently you can’t have two blonde chicks in the film. She has nice jugs here, but if she wasn’t gonna show ‘em playing a hooker in “The Girl Next Door”, you had to know you weren’t getting to see them here. She’s also apparently stolen Jessica Biel’s wardrobe from “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”.

 

The film actually seems more influenced by the 2003 remake of “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (which I rather liked) than any previous “Wax” film, and not a goddamn thing happens in the first 30 minutes except some boring party scenes badly shot by cinematographer Stephen F. Windon (“Fast Five”). In fact, ¾ of that 30 minutes is really just the characters standing around doing nothing. After 45 minutes, something actually sorta kinda happens, but even then it’s still tedious because there’s nothing interesting about any of these characters or performances. It’s a really ugly film thanks to Windon and the drab production design/colour scheme, the title house isn’t as interesting in actuality as it is in theory. The climax with the melting house is well-done, but how can one care when the characters suck?

 

Really, the only memorable thing about the entire film ***** SPOILER ALERT ***** is Hilton’s death scene, which is good, and frankly an international service ***** END SPOILER *****. No one in the making of this film was remotely interested in a house of wax or a house made out of wax. Or anything requiring thought. They just wanted to kill a bunch of people, and even then it takes almost an hour, and only one of the deaths is remotely memorable. The bulk of the film is just people wandering around. Ugh. No, this just won’t do, Dark Castle by and large have released a bunch of disappointments (Their best films seem to be their few non-remakes like “The Hills Run Red” and “Unknown”, though “Orphan” also had the distinction of an absolutely brilliant 11^th hour twist, as mediocre as the rest was), and this is certainly one of them. Supposedly based on the Charles Belden play the other “Wax” films were based on, the screenplay is by Chad and Carey W. Hayes (who unsurprisingly come from a TV background).

 

Rating: D+