Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

Rifftrax Live!: House on Haunted Hill Blu-ray Movie Review

Scary funny.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 5, 2012

RiffTrax might be thought of as Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Next Generation. As I mentioned in my review of RiffTrax’s previous Blu-ray release, Rifftrax: Live! Reefer Madness, MST3K’s Michael J. Nelson and his heckling buddies rather ingeniously skirted whatever copyright laws they might be brushing up against by creating downloadable satirical commentary tracks that consumers could then synch up with their own home video releases of various films and television properties. This post-MST3K enterprise proved to be enormously successful, and of course the next next generation was to “take the show on the road,” so RiffTrax Live! outings have started to appear nationally here and there, and are being memorialized for release themselves on home video (these particular offerings feature only public domain properties—at least so far). Nelson and his compadres, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy, delight an audience in Nashville, Tennessee with their running critiques not just of the main feature, the old Vincent Price stalwart House on Haunted Hill, but (as with the Reefer Madness release) a couple of truly outré shorts that in their own way might be more entertaining (in a patently weird way) than the main feature. Adding to the general madness this time around is actor and comedian Paul F. Tompkins, who is mainly on hand to contribute to the second of the two shorts included here, a bizarre featurette on paper pulp and wood products (see below for more scintillating information). While this RiffTrax Live! event certainly provides decent enough laughs as it ambles along, it’s somewhat weighed down by the lugubrious pace of House on Haunted Hill (something of course the guys themselves mention—repeatedly). Without showman William Castle’s gimmick of Emergo (whereby a large plastic skeleton flew over the supposedly scared silly audience at the film), House on Haunted Hill is actually kind of dull and doesn’t fully rise to the camptastic heights that the MST3K guys typically need to completely pillory their subject. But of course Nelson, Corbett and Murphy are nothing if not game, and they do manage to find a slew of poke-worthy elements about the main film and the really weird shorts as well.

Things get off to a truly bizarre start with one of the oddest shorts these guys have ever tackled, the almost indescribable 1972 opus Magical Disappearing Money, which appears to be some sort of extended public service announcement cluing evidently clueless consumers into the fact that buying in bulk and the like can save considerable dough. What’s so completely odd about this presentation is that it’s hosted (or perhaps ghosted) by a Samantha Stephens-esque witch, replete in early 1970’s floral dress gone horribly, horribly awry. This witch twitches around a grocery store, appearing here, appearing there, but unable to fully attract the attention of any of the mindless consumers who are “wasting” their money on prepackaged instant oatmeal, gallons of milk and sweetened cereal. Finally the witch figures out how to be seen by these stupid, stupid people and goes on to “educate” them about the benefits of buying non- instant oatmeal, powdered milk and any number of other consumer goods that will no doubt outlast the cockroach in the event of nuclear holocaust. The guys get in a number of decent jokes here, including relating the disappearing money to the current economic crisis as well as tying the hostess witch to none other than failed congressional candidate Christine O’Donnell.

Paul F. Tompkins is brought on stage next and does a little riff (no pun intended) on horror movie clichés, including the great trope of the guy who is taking a break from fighting zombies or whatever, and who sneaks into a bathroom to splash some water on his face. Tompkins does a great little routine on that scene we’ve all seen a million times, where the guy looks in the mirror (all clear), puts his head down to the faucet, and then rises back up whereupon we discover a whole horde of nasty bugaboos waiting behind him. It actually brought to mind the recent play on this cliché in the FX series American Horror Story, where guest star Eric Stonestreet (Modern Family) experiences something fairly similar. Of course American Horror Story, as is its wont, played the cliché for both shock and laughs.

The short that Tompkins is on hand for is a really (as in really) strange affair that seems to come from the 1950’s (no copyright was immediately visible, but judging from the apparel, cars and hairstyles, it seems to be a product of the Eisenhower era), a weird promotional pitch for wood pulp and associated products called Paper and I. The film deals with a little boy named Willie who is befriended by a paper bag he was getting ready to blow up and pop. Said paper bag takes Willie on a magical journey to the forests of the southern states of the United States and educates Willie on all of the many ways that paper and associated paper products make life easier for all of us. This is the perfect kind of almost hallucinogenically wacky fare that the MST3K guys specialize in skewering, and they deliver a lot of deadpan humor here. Oddly, Tompkins doesn’t have all that much to contribute.

That brings us to the main part of the evening, the venerable William Castle opus House on Haunted Hill. While there’s nothing really all out lackluster about the guys’ approach here, there isn’t the raucous, nonstop barb throwing that often makes MST3K and its kin so over the top entertaining. In fact the guys are relegated to fare like a running gag about Price’s mustache (one of the funnier lines is early in the film when Vincent Price’s head is describing the cast, and he mentions his wife, at which point one of the guys chimes in, “Wait until you see her mustache!”). There are also running gags about Richard Long’s self-inflicted wounds and Castle’s odd predilection toward slow (as in really slow) pans of various rooms. It’s funny, make no mistake, but it’s rarely guffaw inducing stuff, though to be fair the audience at the Nashville theater seems to be eating it up, and in fact once the show ends, when a fan screams out “More!,” the entire audience erupts in raucous laughter.

Rifftrax Live!: House on Haunted Hill Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

RiffTrax Live! House on Haunted Hill is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Legend Films with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in 1.78 (more or less, read on). Anyone expecting state of the art visuals on a RiffTrax release had better have their heads examined, or at the very least let Nelson and his troupe make some pungent commentary about expectations, for the source elements here are all old public domain prints and as such don't really offer much in the way of videophile wonderment. My hunch is both Magical Disappearing Money and Paper and I were sourced from 16mm, but despite that, they look decent enough, though Paper and I has evidently undergone the Legend Films standby of colorization (as in fact has House on Haunted Hill). Magical Disappearing Money has quite a bit of damage, with a faded image and some scratches and other blemishes dotting individual frames. Paper and I is in much the same shape but might be negligibly better, perhaps somewhat of a surprise considering its greater age. The print for House on Haunted Hill is really rather good, if you can get past the colorization aspect. While there are still occasional dings here and there, overall things look okay if not pristine, with generally good contrast and a decently sharp and well detailed image. In terms of the aspect ratio, as with the previous RiffTrax Blu-ray, what we get is a combination of just the film (or short) playing (in 1.33:1) with audio commentary along with interstitials (in 1.78:1) in Brady Bunch style with the offering on the left hand side of the screen and the three guys "stacked" on the right in little boxes (see screencaps for some examples). The contemporary theater footage of the guys is obviously the best looking of the bunch here, with good color and saturation, and above average if not overwhelming fine detail.

Rifftrax Live!: House on Haunted Hill Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

As with the image quality, there's nothing really to write home about with regard to RiffTrax Live! House on Haunted Hill's standard Dolby Digital 2.0 mix, but by the same token, there's not a whale of a lot to complain about either. This is obviously not material suited to a whiz-bang surround mix, and while some might wish for a lossless LPCM 2.0 offering, the Dolby Digital mix gets things done with a minimum of fuss and bother. There are no real balance issues to speak of, with the commentary easily outweighing the original soundtracks of the film and shorts. The two shorts do have some moderate soundtrack damage, but it's really not a big issue as what we're listening to is the commentary anyway. Fidelity for the three (and with Tompkins, four) guys' routines is just fine.

Rifftrax Live!: House on Haunted Hill Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Fun Trivia Slide Show contains a bunch of silly faux trivia factoids.
• Behind the Scenes Slide Show (1080i; 2:51) shows stills of the theater being set up for this Rifftrax performance, as well as a few shots of the actual performance.
• Rifftrax Commercial 1 (1080i; 00:56)
• Rifftrax Commercial 2 (1080i; 1:08)

Rifftrax Live!: House on Haunted Hill Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Lovers of MST3K and RiffTrax will no doubt get their money's worth with this release, but what might surprise some longtime fans is just how much funnier (and weirder) the two shorts included here are than the main feature. There are plenty of barbs and dry humor galore sprinkled thoughout the three offerings on tap, though most of the really funny stuff is top weighted toward the two preliminary shorts. While supplementary material here is really pretty sparse, overall this release comes Recommended.