PopHorror Let's Get Scared
NOTE: This story was published during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the films being covered here wouldn’t exist. PopHorror fully supports the WGA and SAG-AFTRA and their efforts.
It was bound to happen. What with the recent spate of all things Amityville: Amityville Shark, Amityville Scarecrow, Amityville Karen, and Amityville Vibrator (!). Anyone with a decent camera, a few friends who can easily be conned into “acting”, and a half-assed idea, can, and often does, make a movie with a least a teeny bit of built in horror cred by tacking the “Amityville” moniker onto the title (we reviewed 20 or so of them here). Enter Amityville Death Toilet.
Amityville Death Toilet Synopsis
Gregg G. Allin has a semi-successful podcast exploring paranormal events. When Amityville is overrun with a spate of toilet murders leading back to the haunted house of yesteryear, Gregg wastes no time flying into town to get some answers. With Amityville’s Mayor Dump demanding answers and an end to the killings, Gregg is perplexed because this Amityville house doesn’t seem to be that scary. Looks are very deceiving, and, after a toilet in the house mutilates Sebastian the caretaker, Gregg is forced to act. What ensues is a battle like no other where Gregg is pushed to the very limits of hell and beyond in an effort to save the town… and the world.
Have a look at the official trailer below!
The Franchise Continues…
From the writer/director of the 5, yes you read that right, FIVE Death Toilet films, Evan Jacobs comes this way off the mark attempt at both humor, and a stab at the current Amityville joke. Featuring Isaac Golub (you guessed it, Death Toilet 1-5) as Greg G. Allin (GG Allin, get it? an not-so-subtle nod to the fecal/punk hero) a paranormal podcaster/investigator tasked with saving Amityville’s tourist trade from doom by the aptly named Mayor Dump (Mike Hartsfield; Death Toilet 5) after a rash of grisly toilet murders. Yes, there’s an evil toilet murdering people…with cleavers, whirring blades, and even a gun.
With both its toilet humor, and its Jaws references (Amity. Amityville. Get it? Gotta keep the tourist money coming in…) Amityville Death Toilet really tries to be a fun horror/comedy, it really does. But it falls so flat in the execution that one has to wonder if Jacobs ran out of poop jokes at around Death Toilet 3: Doody Calls. I’m no elitist, I can enjoy as much toilet humor as your average 13 year old, but Amityville Death Toilet lacks the charm of say, The Toxic Avenger, lacks the goofy, sardonic humor of, like, anything in James Balsamo’s body of work, and lacks the basic fundamental elements of any, and I mean any, “classic” so-bad-it’s-good horror/comedy.
Everything is played so straight that, rather than letting the viewer in on the joke, it almost seems as if the intent was to show contempt for the audience –“You clicked on the streaming link/bought a DVD, this is what you get, sucker!” And I really tried to find some redeeming qualities in this film, but with the needless shots designed to, obviously, pad the running time, to the oft repeated dialogue intended to do the same (do we really need that many phone calls of the Mayor repeating himself over and over?), it just makes it a war of attrition for the viewer to get through the thing.
Final Thoughts
Is Amityville Death Toilet a bad film? Short answer: Yes. Could it have been better? Definitely. Winks and nods to the classics you’re spoofing that are as subtle as a brick to the chin, and “jokes” that go nowhere really fast, are not enough to save a film that seems like it was written around a flimsy title/idea. It seems, in the end, that Jacobs and company are merely taking the piss (pun intended). Maybe, somewhere, there’s an audience for films like this… If anyone discovers where, let me know, I know a good therapist to recommend.
Amityville Death Toilet is available now on DVD and Blu-ray from select retailers
