Housesitters (2018) – A Half-Baked Horror Movie Review

If you were a lazy, unemployed pothead and your best friend was a low level drug dealer with time to spare, what would be the perfect job for you? Why, housesitting, of course! In Jason Coffman’s horror comedy, Housesitters, two entertaining yet hugely irresponsible Millennials take a job watching the empty home in a position seemingly custom made for them. The only drawback is the bloody pentagram down in the basement. But whatever, right? There’s a trampoline and the owner’s shiny, new credit card to break in! Time’s a-wastin’!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3IwdGEvTKI

Brought to us by Dreamland Home Video and Tomorrow Romance, Housesitters was directed, produced, co-written and edited by by Jason Coffman (Nothing Good Ever Happens 2016). Rounding out the scriptwriting team are debut actresses Jamie Jirak and Annie Wilkins, who also played the main characters, Izzy and Angie. Also starring are Jay J. Bidwell (Moving Parts 2017), Peter Ash (Screams on Planet Zero! 2013), Bethanie Louise, Ben Schlotfelt (Spread 2012), Mariah Michael (Ginger 2018) and James Timothy Peters (Beware of the Klowns 2015). Tatiana von Recklinghausen was in charge of both makeup and sound and had a hand in puppeteering Little Bastard, the demon’s familiar puppet. Assistant Director Jef Burnham also helped with the puppet and handled a camera, as well. The creation of Little Bastard himself was from the mind of Dustin Wayde Mills, the man behind the were-creature in the upcoming film, Lycanimator, and the visual effects from Space Babes From Outer Space (2017).

In Housesitters, small time drug dealer Izzy (Jirak) and unemployed Angie (Watkins) get a job housesitting for “some guy” in a house that seems too good to be true. This guy left them full run of his huge home, a platinum credit card to buy any takeout their hearts’ desired… and a bloody pentagram in the basement. But it’s fine! They’ve got plenty of pot, a mainline to the nearest pizza place and Pappy’s Porn Box. No worries at all. That is, until the girls and Izzy’s boyfriend, Zack (Ash), rise above their pot- and porn-fueled haze and start remembering that there are other friends in the house that they haven’t seen for hours. As they try to find the others, they stumble upon a letter from the man who hired them to housesit, and that’s when all Hell… or, at least, a tiny corner of Hell… breaks loose. Armed with a butter knife, a mini baseball bat and a pooper scooper, the three venture down into the basement to try and solve this demonic mystery, all before the Korean takeout place down the street closes.

There are so many things I loved about Housesitters.

• The punny, crude humor is right up my alley. You’ve got birthday cards that say, “Angela, you’re not my daughter, but I still love you more than Isabelle. Love, Mom,” and girls that say things like, “I have a Masters in Pornography Studies. I should get to talk about it.” Cindy’s (Michael) friend sounds suspiciously like Charlie Brown’s mom, plus the intense, tension-building scene music that was really only Izzy’s cell phone ringtone. There are just so many funny things to mention, if I were to list them all, I’d be here all day.
• Jamie Jirak and Annie Watkins, the actresses who play Izzy and Angie, have great chemistry. I had no problem believing that these two had been best friends for their entire lives. I bet Coffman could have let them just adlib their way through the script, and it would have been just as funny. They were also not afraid to go the extra mile to get great responses from the audience, even if it made them look less than perfect. That’s the mark of dedicated actors.

• The intermission “commercial” for the upcoming faux cartoon, Dancing About Barkitecture… I have no idea where this freaking thing came from, but it’s inclusion in Housesitters is just perfect. The cringeworthy computer graphics, the animals speaking in different languages and the storyline – a bulldog wants to be a building when he grows up – all combine into a surreal and creepy-silly production. It’s the chocolate frosting on this nutty Devil’s food cake.
• There’s also the opening video ad for the girls’ housesitting services. What a fantastic way to set the mood and launch the wacky story of these crazy girls. “We’ll even wash your fruit!”
• The clever script and dialogue in Housesitters are superb. With the obvious lack of resources that these filmmakers had to work with, they did an outstanding job creating an incomparable film that sparks with ingenuity, imagination and outstanding inventiveness. Who knew so many original yet terrifying things could happen in one average suburban home? It all goes to show what you can do with a humorous, edgy script, a cutely menacing puppet, a few gallons of fake blood, some passionate, creative people and a single house. I can’t sing the praises of Coffman & Co. enough.
• Last but not least, I have to mention Little Bastard, the demon’s familiar. He’s terribly cheesy but totally lovable. Who wouldn’t want to be eaten alive by this charmingly sinister critter?

The only grumble I have with Housesitters was the Rachel timeline. While I understood what happened to her, I didn’t get her exposited history, which was told, in the film’s final climactic moment, by the demon. Her mom was pregnant in 1991, and again in 1998, but there was only one kid, and there was something about her trying to get her life in order, and then suddenly, she has some kind of weapon… I don’t know, it just didn’t make much sense to me. I think fleshing it out more and adding a few of the non-sequitur aspects that the rest of the film had going on would have helped tie it in to the rest of the story, especially given its importance to the plot.

Final Thoughts

It’s not every day that two bumbling anti-heroines can carry a movie as well as Jamie Jirak and Annie Watkins do in Housesitters. The originality and humor of this film makes it stand out above many other indie flicks that I’ve seen in my years of reviewing horror movies. Although it’s not what I would call scary, it did have enough genre elements to tickle my horror fancy. I loved this movie, and I’m thrilled that I got the chance to review it. Housesitters makes its world premiere at Windy City Horrorama this Saturday, April 28th at 3:45PM in the David Theater on 4614 N. Lincoln Ave. in Chicago, Illinois. If you’re in the area, you’ll be doing your horror-loving self a favor by checking it out.

EDIT: Housesitters is now available on Amazon Prime!