Halloween delivers the perfect excuse to be scared without actually being in danger. From haunted houses to spooky hayrides and jump scares during trick-or-treating, it's the season for safe scares. In this found-footage gem, things start to go awry for the team putting together a haunted house before it becomes a bloody graveyard on opening night.
Hell House LLC is a found-footage horror movie shot in a documentary format. It was released in 2015 and has become a cult classic in the horror genre over the last decade. It's currently streaming for free on Tubi.
I've been a fan of found-footage horror movies since the original Blair Witch Project in 1999. Since then, I've inhaled every flick in the genre I can get my hands on. Hell House LLC delivers a creepy, dread-filled descent that avoids the genre's pitfalls and sends chills up my spine every time I watch it.
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A haunt attraction goes terribly wrong in Hell House LLC. Cognetti Films
The movie starts with mentions of a tragedy five years ago, when a haunt attraction, aptly named Hell House, went terribly wrong and left a trail of bodies behind. It uses a combination of interviews with witnesses and journalists and footage from the event itself to set the scene of the tragedy at the Abaddon Hotel, all through the lens of a local documentarian seeking the truth about what went wrong the night Hell House opened.
Hell House LLC starts with how things ended, which means that as you watch everything happening, you know it will all end in tragedy. Before you meet the Hell House crew, you see the aftermath of the night everything went wrong. From a panicked 911 call to a local videographer who sneaks into the abandoned hotel to take a look, the movie delivers plenty of questions to get into your head, but ultimately no answers.
When local documentarian Diane Graves manages to score an interview with missing crew member Sara Havel, things begin to get interesting. Sara has been out of sight since the night everything went wrong, but she agrees to sit down and explain what happened -- not only on the night that Hell House opened its doors to guests but also in the weeks leading up to the tragedy.
The rising dread as things get worse inside of the Abaddon Hotel makes this movie worth a watch. Cognetti Films
When Sara arrives at the interview, she brings tapes that have never been seen before. They detail the experiences of the Hell House crew, from finding the house to running into supernatural occurrences before opening night. While things are initially a little campy with a pack of 20-somethings exploring the hotel and discussing their plans, things quickly begin to go south. The Abaddon Hotel has plenty of problems, and the crew plans to sleep there until the show finishes its run.
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