Dr. Moreau's House of Pain is set in the 40's where boxer Eric Carson (John Patrick Jordan) is searching for his brother Roy who has mysteriously disappeared, Eric traces Roy last known sighting to a seedy strip bar & is told Roy was last seen with exotic dancer Alliana (Lorielle New) & Eric decides to confront her. However Eric sees Alliana kill a man in an alley & instead decides to follow her along with a newspaper reporters named Mary Anne (Debra Mayer) & Judith (Jessica Lancaster), Alliana drives to a disused sanatorium & while following her Mary Anne is kidnapped by a mutant creature. Eric & Judith try to find Mary Anne but only end up imprisoned themselves by several half human half animal mutants created by the sadistic Dr. Moreau (Jacob Witkin) who has been carrying out gruesome experiments in order to create a perfect half human half animal hybrid & he is always on the look out for fresh victims to experiment on...
Directed by legendary low budget film maker Charles Band this has nothing to do with classic novel by H.G. Wells other than call an evil scientist Dr. Moreau & feature some manimals, overall this is a pretty poor effort in terms of plot but it is quite well made although I am not sure if that's much of a trade-off. The script was obviously based around the fact the production had no money & sets 90% of it in a few rooms & corridors with a very small cast too, the story doesn't grab you & there's no real build up to the revelation of the manimals & if you think about it for any length of time it all falls apart. At just over 70 odd minutes in length it's short but I did think it dragged at times & when your film is only 70 odd minutes long the one thing it shouldn't do is drag. The character's are bland & it's unclear what the ultimate purpose of Dr Moreau's experiments are, the dialogue is average & not enough happens really, the house of pain part of the title also might be rather misleading as this is quite tame.
The manimal make-up effects are quite poor, it's too obvious that the actor's are wearing cheap face mask's especially the half man half pig manimal. There are one or two moments of gore, a fist is punched through someones head, there's a slashed open stomach, a slit throat & some blood splatter but not much else. There isn't even much nudity as only one woman gets her kit off & even she isn't that attractive. The one thing that does stand out here is the colourful photography by Mac Ahlberg who photographed most of Band's better films during his Empire Pictures days, while most of the scene remains dark people's clothes or light sources are bright neon colours which looks quite cool actually at times. There's a nod to Re-Animator (1985) as bright green liquid is syringes are seen & that fire axe on the back of that door which never gets used looks very much like the one used at the end of Re-Animator...
With a supposed budget of about $300,000 effort was obviously put into the look of Dr. Moreau's House of Pain but that sort of effort is sorely lacking in just about every other department & never rises above average. The acting is forgettable, the plodding dialogue doesn't do anyone anyone any favours though.
Dr. Moreau's House of Pain looks alright but the film feels padded at even 70 odd minutes as various little things happen to merely fill the time it seems, it looks quite nice I suppose but that's about the best I can say for it. Watch the original The Island of Dr. Moreau (1977) again instead.
Directed by legendary low budget film maker Charles Band this has nothing to do with classic novel by H.G. Wells other than call an evil scientist Dr. Moreau & feature some manimals, overall this is a pretty poor effort in terms of plot but it is quite well made although I am not sure if that's much of a trade-off. The script was obviously based around the fact the production had no money & sets 90% of it in a few rooms & corridors with a very small cast too, the story doesn't grab you & there's no real build up to the revelation of the manimals & if you think about it for any length of time it all falls apart. At just over 70 odd minutes in length it's short but I did think it dragged at times & when your film is only 70 odd minutes long the one thing it shouldn't do is drag. The character's are bland & it's unclear what the ultimate purpose of Dr Moreau's experiments are, the dialogue is average & not enough happens really, the house of pain part of the title also might be rather misleading as this is quite tame.
The manimal make-up effects are quite poor, it's too obvious that the actor's are wearing cheap face mask's especially the half man half pig manimal. There are one or two moments of gore, a fist is punched through someones head, there's a slashed open stomach, a slit throat & some blood splatter but not much else. There isn't even much nudity as only one woman gets her kit off & even she isn't that attractive. The one thing that does stand out here is the colourful photography by Mac Ahlberg who photographed most of Band's better films during his Empire Pictures days, while most of the scene remains dark people's clothes or light sources are bright neon colours which looks quite cool actually at times. There's a nod to Re-Animator (1985) as bright green liquid is syringes are seen & that fire axe on the back of that door which never gets used looks very much like the one used at the end of Re-Animator...
With a supposed budget of about $300,000 effort was obviously put into the look of Dr. Moreau's House of Pain but that sort of effort is sorely lacking in just about every other department & never rises above average. The acting is forgettable, the plodding dialogue doesn't do anyone anyone any favours though.
Dr. Moreau's House of Pain looks alright but the film feels padded at even 70 odd minutes as various little things happen to merely fill the time it seems, it looks quite nice I suppose but that's about the best I can say for it. Watch the original The Island of Dr. Moreau (1977) again instead.