Invitation to Hell (1982)

Best movie of this year hands down!

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Laura invites her college friend Jacky out to her country estate for a costume party.What Jacky does not know is that she is a pawn in a demonic game.That evening she is drugged and taken out to what appears to be a black magic altar.The next morning she awakens with claw-like scratches on her legs and,when she tries to escape,finds she is trapped in this location.But why are her friends keeping her here and who do they truly serve?Pretty boring and drawn-out horror flick which lasts only 50 minutes or so.There are some wonderfully odd and surreal moments plus some nasty gore on display.The acting is very bad,but if you are into micro-budget horror cinema give this one a swirl.5 satanic farms out of 10.

I know the sound is horrid if you can even call it sound and the acting is garbage again if you can call it acting. But this film does turn away most people and i like that about this film. By being a horrid mess it makes the film more personal to me. So when I watch it I feel like it is my own movie. Also for any one looking for the Wes Craven Invitation to Hell this is not it. That film is worse to watch than this. Even though the Craven movie can be heard it still sucks because Susan Lucici (or however you spell her name) should have stayed in Daytime Limbo where she belongs and not muddled up the great Wes Craven's movie. So if you want a film that takes a little work to watch Invitation to Hell (1982) is for you. trust me when your friends are at school talking about the latest Michael Bay crap fest you can blow them away with your knowledge of underground cinema. I know it worked for me.

Maybe I'm just mad I spent five dollars on this instead of one dollar, but this film really displeased me. It's semi-known for it's gore and perhaps 'banned' status. I could not make out many of the details because the tape quality (Videoline Productions) was extremely poor, but the gore I saw was not exceptional. There were lots of guests over when I was watching this video and I was kind of embarrassed to be caught viewing some of the film's more boring moments. When there is no action on screen, the combination of bad acting, bad dialogue, and an uncompelling story make this movie a waste of time.

SPOILERS INCLUDED Invitation to Hell is a true mystery production- only three quarters of an hour long it seems to have been planned as a support featurette to a major release film, a brief niche in the dying days of both double features and the British film industry. It was never to be shown that way though and debuted on tape via a fly by night distributor around 1982- double billed with The Last Night, another short from the Michael J Murphy stable- bringing it to feature length. The Last Night depicts a shoddy bunch of amateur dramatic actors being terrorised by two escaped lunatics and is unique for being shot entirely in somnambulist slow motion - unsurprisingly when Invitation was reissued (in censored form) this support was not included. Invitation to Hell is Mr Murphy's minimalist gung-ho farmyard horror film- Maurice (Colin Efford) is a mute bodybuilder who exercises in front of porno pictures- Maurice works on Manor Farm where a bunch of students have unleashed 'the eternal lustings of the evil being'. Jackie (Becky Simpson) is tricked into staying at the farm's cottage where a Hallowe'en party quickly generates into a sinister black mass. Jackie wakes up the next morning with claw marks on her navel, to be told by her friends that they've accidently unleashed the spirit of the evil being who now lurks on the farm and since Jackie is a virgin the evil being wants to mate with her 'tomorrow night is the night of the spring equinox he will come to you to propagate his kind in flesh and blood- his offspring will be the most powerful thing on Earth'. Although any girl's reaction would be 'have arse will travel' (as Pat Astley would say) no one can leave the farm and occasionally the evil one possesses Maurice, encouraging him to butcher his friends when they step out of line. He impales one of the girls on a pitchfork and when a 'slut' farmgirl comes onto him, telling him she's leaving 'before I get done in' Maurice crushes her head like a raw egg. Although its a humourless film Invitation to Hell becomes irresistibly amusing due to how apathetic the inhabitants appear over the Satanic forces they are under siege from - murder and carnage it seems takes second place to arguments over who should take the HP sauce downstairs at night 'bring me back a brandy old chap'. Everyone seems aware of Maurice's 'problem' but don't really seem bothered, only Alan (Steven Longhurst) acknowledges his murder sprees and all he does is berat him with the severity you would a child who hasn't put away all his toys 'you know what he made you do before, and take your boots off before you go to bed'. Occasionally Alan is possessed by the evil being too- making silly faces and dispensing advice to Maurice 'have you killed Laura (changes to 'evil being' voice) YOU'VE DONE WELL I AM PLEASED'. Murphy also gives the film an off the wall sexual edge too as Jackie, none too pleased in the knowledge she's going to be worked over by some randy fiend tries to get one of the satanists into bed- Maurice however saves the day sticking a knife through the stuffy stud's neck- a terminal case of coitus interruptus indeed. Far more unusual in the horror film pantheon is the hint of a sexual relationship between Alan and Maurice. Drunkenly bursting in on Maurice flexing his muscles over girlie pictures, a catty Alan fires darts into the model's breasts (this imagery was later cut from the film) and remarks 'you ought to come down the pub with me, I know you ain't gonna talk but you'll be something to look at'. Eventually Maurice fights a demonically possessed Alan, who ends up wrapped in a carpet and thrown onto a bonfire. In the remarkable last reel Alan however returns as a burnt skeleton in a sack to crucify a topless Maurice to his wall of dirty pictures. 'You cannot kill me, I am Death' the monster tells Maurice as he pulls his heart out, splashing blood over Maurice's beloved bust models. While bloody death is the spectacle, bad acting is the real star of Invitation to Hell. With his thick Cornish accent, raspy 'evil being' voice and attempts to act drunk, any scene with Longhurst in is wickedly funny. Also look out for a soon to be murdered girl's strange ode to 'safe old Putney' as well as the pompous actor who delivers the aforementioned 'Spring Equinox' speech with stunning disinterest. Next to nothing is known about these people or their 'creation' although the crummy world of amateur dramatics depicted in The Last Night and stock company of actors that appear in both shorts gives the impression that Invitation to Hell was thrown together by a frustrated acting troupe trying to crawl up the lower end of the showbiz ladder. No further features by Michael J Murphy exist, nor have his actors appeared in anything else. Invitation too has very much disappeared from sight and is known to the few, yet Murphy's brief contribution to the seedy side of british cinema with its bad dream like illogicality, potmarked by goofy Herschell Gordon Lewis violence and a strong sexual undercurrent is in its own way quite likable and if nothing else a curio number. Maybe one day every british cottage will have a trashy horror movie like this made in it.