Film Review: Hell House LLC: The Carmichael Manor (2023)
Terror Films
(this review is spoiler-free.)
Stephen Cognetti’s 2015 film, Hell House LLC, began one of the better found footage series of the past decade, spawning multiple sequels that, while never managing to surpass the original in the eyes of most fans, preserved the memorable tone of the first film while expanding the backstory of the Abaddon Hotel. Even as the subgenre waned in wider popularity, the Hell House movies continued to find an audience with each installment, and today are regarded as among the foremost found footage films of the 2010s.
Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor (hence, “Hell House Origins” or “HHO”) immediately feels like a reset for the series, departing the Abaddon Hotel for the nearby mansion of a reclusive millionaire whose ties to the infamous hotel are revealed throughout the story. This feels like a smart pivot, giving new life to the series with fresh environments and setpieces, though retaining the core aesthetic of what made the earlier films effective scare fodder. While it’s hard to beat a successful original, especially when subsequent entries have been reviewed less favorably, Hell House Origins comes damned close, and is a decided step in the right direction for the wider series.
Your Next Haunting Starts Here
Departing the Abaddon Hotel (though only to the next town over), HHO Focuses on a remote mansion belonging to the Carmichael family, who in 1989 had two members murdered and two more disappear under mysterious circumstances. The bizarre incident was preceded by the death of the youngest daughter, Catherine, who had perished in a car accident just months before, leaving police officials as well as family and friends befuddled as to what exactly happened to the Carmichaels, and shocked as to the sheer scale of tragedy which could successively befall a family.
What follows is a pretty standard haunted house setup: the residence falls into the hands of a distant caretaker who has agreed to let a pair of paranormal investigators in. In this case, it’s Margot and Rebecca, romantic partners who also side-gig as internet sleuths and seekers of all things strange. Their plan is to spend a few days in the Carmichael mansion and document all they see and hear. The film indicates that while local teens visited the location over the years and partied on the grounds, there’s no known instance of someone being inside since the murders, and as such the interior is preserved just as it was when the Carmichaels disappeared.
…sort of. The first seam that I noticed is that the interior of the mansion itself looks remarkably like a meticulously cleaned AirBNB, completely devoid of personal effects from the former family. This seemed to cut against the earlier emphasis placed on how no one had been in the mansion, as it certainly doesn’t look like (real) people were living there long-term. This could have been explained away in a single line during the setup, but feels like an oversight. Perhaps a pithy criticism, but it was a touch immersion-breaking, as I got a bit distracted looking for details of the Carmichael family among all that sterile luxury.
That minor issue aside, the investigator characters are solid and nicely contrasted. Margot, the enthusiast propelling the paranormal investigation, and is exuberant, irreverent, and occasionally silly, dismissive or oblivious to her partner’s concerns. On the other hand, Rebecca is self-serious, more focused on her day job than ghost hunting, and it becomes readily apparent that this investigation and the wider paranormal exploration is just something she’s doing to support Margot. It’s a curious dynamic, seemingly unavoidably tragic as the audience can see from the beginning that Rebecca is destined to outgrow her partner. In addition to the couple, there’s Margot’s brother, Chase, who has recently suffered a hallucinatory incident and is implied to be potentially unwell. When he does arrive, he seems affable enough, and it’s indicated that his psychological experience may be more supernatural.
Waiting for Dusk
While found footage films are synonymous with a slow burn, gradually building strangeness before (usually) turning the dial all the way up in the final act, Hell House Origins gets things rolling very quickly with scary setpieces while maintaining the sense that the terror is veering toward a crescendo. If you’re one of those who generally finds the genre too slow, I’d encourage you to check out this film, as it really creates a new iteration of the Blair Witch formula that feels fresh and exciting while still preserving the essential elements.
Shortly after their arrival, Margot finds a storage room that contains creepy clown mannequins very similar to those at the Abaddon Hotel, and on the very first night in the mansion they hear a female voice singing from the floor below. What fans of the genre expect thereafter is a cycle of build-and-relax, typically focusing additional story and subtle creepiness during daytime scenes and ratcheting up the horror by night, but HHO, at least for a while, elects to invert the formula to excellent results.
Rather than rely on mysterious noises and extended sequences of filming dark hallways, HHO goes for overt terror and garish setpieces by day, isolating different characters in sequence and presenting them with distinctive horrors, all while steadily pulling the curtain back on the Carmichael family and their connection to the Abaddon.
The story itself is politely present, neither drawing too much attention from the front-and-center scares, nor looking to be something viewers will reflect on. It hums the bars of a wider narrative without making that narrative especially intriguing. Cognetti has indicated continued ambitions for the series, and in this fourth entry opened up new storylines in the history of the Abaddon, but it feels like he should be tying up loose ends and drawing down the story created in the first three films rather than planting more trees in the orchard. On the heels of that, I also think he tried a lot of new things in this film that ultimately succeeded, so I think it would be a mistake to declare the story of Hell House bloated beyond necessity. I just wonder how many deeper layers you need when the story is still undeservedly thin.
The final act drags a bit, stumbling into some plot (inexplicably stalled car) and visual (inexplicable black-robed figures in the distance) clichés which cut against the creativity on display in earlier parts of the film, but this doesn’t detract too much from the high points, which are what I believe viewers will remember foremost .
Night Four
Hell House LLC: The Carmichael Manor feels like a distinctly modern found footage movie, not getting waylaid or distracted, keeping the scenes moving and putting plentiful scares throughout. The fourth installment of Hell House LLC has renewed my interest in the series, and comes damned close to surpassing the excellent original chapter. I believe Cognetti and company really made a creative effort with this film, both to do something new and expand on the work of the original trilogy, and the results are decidedly successful.
Particularly for a fourth installment, Hell House Origins feels surprisingly layered and smartly paced for a found footage movie, and while the plot and story elements aren’t quite as sharp as I’d like, they are sufficiently articulated and do not detract from the film as a whole. While the mythos behind the Abaddon feels a touch spider-webbed, branching into many dark corners without a great deal of depth, there’s clear indication that these elements will be expanded upon in future installments. I hope they are done justice, and this series which had begun to wane finds a fresh audience.
Verdict: 7/10
Strengths
Creative, effective terror, especially in the daytime
Features a nice blend of building dread and jumpscares
Solid acting and script
Weaknesses
Final act loses steam
Some fans may dislike detachment from Abbadon
More questions than answers around the backstory,
Presently, Hell House LLC is available exclusively on Shudder.
You may also like: Grave Encounters, Haunt, The Houses October Built
