House of Dust (2013)

Every once in a while Hollywood tries a new variation of the haunted house genre, and every once in a while, it works. This is not one of those times. The movie starts out with a flashback with a doctor doing lobotomies when one of his patients escapes and kills the doctor. The orderlies then take him out, stage a murder scene and burn the evidence in the hospital crematorium. Jump to the present and we get into the real movie; actress Inbar Lavi plays Emma, a new student at Eastern Connecticut State University. Her roommate, Gabby, introduces her to Colt and Dylan and take her to a burning trashcan party in the vacant front property in front of the abandoned Redding Home Asylum. In time, we learn Emma is psychic, although she has been using medicine to drown out the voices for years. When she is drawn into the hospital by the voices of one of patients killed at the start, her friends follow her inside but accidentally knock over a shelf with the forgotten canisters holding the ashes of the three cremated in the prologue. The spirits of the three patients infest the three as a result - Colt becomes psychotic, Dylan develops Intense OCD and Gabby becomes manic depressive. After the local mean girl gets murdered, Emma starts to realize what's happening. It's not very scary; in fact, the plot does get tedious and drags in places, but it is atmospheric and the acting is pretty good. However, it kind of ends on an incomplete note with no police involvement or resolutions. The other big problem I have is that the movie is based loosely on the discovery of actual abandoned human ashes found abandoned at Oregon State Hospital in 2015. Making a horror movie instead of a documentary on this discovery seems quite in bad taste to me. "House of Dust" is a fair horror movie that isn't really that memorable except for this fact. It's worth a look for its creepy moments, but it's not as intense as one would expect a horror movie should be.

This film is "awful". I cannot believe I just sat through this. There is quite literally ZERO script. House of Dust is like the worst improv you have ever seen. There is literally nothing I can say about this film will make this any better for you.The review on here by Delia Berlin is "blatantly" written by the director or the writer. It is "that" obvious guys..... sorry to call you out.I have literally NO IDEA AT ALL of how this film got any funding with this screenplay. Atrocious.The actress playing the lead character is obviously very talented, and was the 'only' reason I watched the film to the end.The script didn't seem to include any writing for any of the other characters, so the film seemed reliant on continual drone-like music, which drowned out every single scene. Any film with continual music, should be an indicator that it is a bad film, because there is nothing else it can offer.You really shouldn't watch this if you see this comment. If you have read this comment and then gone onto watch House of Dust? then you know why you're feeling like a complete idiot right now.

I love anchor bay entertainment! But like most other distribution companies, they run out of money, and I guess "House of dust" is what you get when that occurs..First off, the story of this movie. Once I got the main idea of the story, a huge face palm was planted on my face. In this case, the story of this movie is clichéd, and has been seen millions, of billions of times before, delivering absolutely nothing new in the sense of entertainment. The so called "Legend" is a massive cliché that has portrayed in many, many other films, as well as the characters, location, etc.Next, the killer, or foe in this tale. One word, once again, cliché. The killed has been portrayed in many others films! Yet again I say! And in this movie, the killer wasn't even executed all that well, making him seem foolish, and stupid in a way that drags this film deeper then it already is..Lastly, the cinematography, sound, overall execution, and characters. The characters, or in this case main characters were, like the rest of this movie clichéd. They were a bunch of collage kids that listened to the strong, "better" guy of the group, getting themselves into trouble, and DEATH. The cinematography of the film was shallow. Some shots were flawed, making it look terrible. Some of the lighting, as well made the scenes look dull, and misplaced. Overall depressing - like when it wasn't meant to. Moving along, almost everything of the film was reliant of CGI, and it was horrible looking. They used CGI from fire, to a shattering light bulb. All of which was horrible, misplaced looking. Finally, the sound. Most of the soundtrack didn't fit! Some music sequences sounded like action when noting really was happening, throwing us viewers off track! And concluding, the scares. Horrible! There were none, no tension, thrills, nothing. Once we got anything, thought, it was lame, horrid jump scares! No! In conclusion. This is a bad, bad, bad low budget film that tried to be more then it was, leading in an ultimate downfall! This movie failed from beginning, to end! More money wasted! Stay away from this one, I honestly have no intentions of recommending this to anyone, for it's another uneventful, cliché fest that angers, instead pleasing.

Beautifully shot ghost story full of spooky moon lit scenes of northeast Connecticut. Recognizing scenes of the wonderful campus of Eastern Connecticut State University is a special treat for Willimantic area fans. Inspired by a real story of cremation remains of patients found at an abandoned asylum for the "mentally insane" this fantasy often gets too close to reality for comfort. A.D. Calvo has a knack for contrasting beauty and horror, both through images and sounds. This is not a movie to watch alone. In the end, the boundaries of mental health and sanity blur as fantasy and reality trade places. As always, questions are answered as new questions remain.