The People Under the Stairs

The film carries this over into the Bush (Mk. 1) years — showing the “people under the stairs” (imprisoned children the couple kidnapped, then mutilated and kept out of sight when they didn’t live up the couple’s ideals) being entertained and kept quiet with a TV showing the bombing of Bagdad during Desert Storm while the film’s soundtrack plays Krzysztof Penderecki’s Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima. It doesn’t get much more pointed — or more angry. This doesn’t mean that the film forgets to be horrific in the usual sense — only that the horror trappings are being used to make a point.

Visually — and this includes the production design — the film is striking. The house in which most of the action takes place is among the creepiest — and most improbable — in the history of old dark houses. It has almost TARDIS qualities in that there’s no way the exterior matches up with the cavernous interior. And that interior is a singularly twisted creation — like a cross between the one in Lew Landers’ The Raven (1935) and a Max Fleischer cartoon. At the same time, there are intimations of Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) and Ken Russell’s Crimes of Passion (1984) in some of the individual details. It’s like a little world of the mind — an unhealthy mind.

Aspects of the film are in the “splatstick” mode, which works nicely because you never know when the comedy is going to turn deadly serious. It’s also a nice change to see a movie that actually gives its child star, Brandon Adams, the top billing he deserves. There are imperfections to be sure, especially in the make-up for the title characters. There’s no way to gloss over the fact that it’s cheesy and cheap, but it’s a small price to pay for such a ballsy work.

The Thursday Horror Picture Show will screen The People Under the Stairs Thursday, Oct. 8, at 8 p.m. in Theater Six at The Carolina Asheville, hosted by Xpress movie critic Ken Hanke.