October 25th, 2014 
Drew Caruso 
Of all the holidays celebrated worldwide, no single day is more loved by the UTG staff than Halloween. With the arrival of the year’s best month, the time has finally come to begin rolling out a plethora of features and special announcements we have prepared in celebration of our favorite day, including the one you’re about to read.
Now in its third year, 31 Days Of Halloween is a recurring feature that will run throughout the month of October. The hope and goal of this column is to supply every UTG reader with a daily horror (or Halloween-themed) movie recommendation that is guaranteed to amplify your All Hallows’ Eve festivities. We’ll be watching every film the day it’s featured, and we hope you’ll follow along at home.
[Warning: the material within is likely NSFW]
Day 25: Hausu (1977)
To be honest there is no correct place to begin any kind of conscious thought on the 1977 Japanese film, Hausu, but let’s go for it anyway.
Hausu is a film that has a wide range of hilarity, imagination, eeriness, unsightliness, whimsy, and creativity. What would normally constitute a bare plot, (seven schoolgirls spend a weekend in an idyllic country home, only to be slaughtered one by one by a malevolent force) is illuminated by some of the most creative and imaginative death scenes conjured in any horror movie to date. Watching the film unfold to modern moviegoers could be equated to the evil twin of say, Michel Gondry, gone mad in stylistic fashion. Blood flies throughout the frame with a sense of certainty, and flair, as if each subsequent splatter was consciously ridden from the innocent schoolgirls venturing into a house filled with surreal horror.
Honestly, nothing will prepare you for what this film holds, and about 30 minutes into viewing, the quick ten-second bit of chandelier horror will give a glimpse into the weird that is about to be unleashed. From there, the surreal fully takes hold, as you can see Hausu‘s cute and quirky atmosphere bleed into the unsettling and eerie. The fun and frantic soundtrack will create an equilibrium with the attuned horror, so that the film itself is never truly scary, but, the atmosphere presented creates an environment filled with unsettling imagery, jarring editing and cinematography, and a vibe that is unlike anything seen before. Take all this into account along with the film’s 1977 release date, and you’ll wonder why it has taken you so long to experience such a surreal experience.
What becomes another interesting aspect of the film, aside from its creativity and vividly gory imagination, is its ability to create transcendent imagery in a world and story sparsely explained. A moment where Gorgeous (yeah, that is her name. Quite normal when you consider her friends Kung Fu, Fantasy, Melody, and so on) is consumed through a mirror as she sees a younger version of her aunt, only for her body to break apart like the mirror she is viewing into, revealing an inner core of flame, anguish, unfulfilled familial questions, and the innocence entered with the girls as they began their getaway.
With a showering of blood, Hausu is an escape from horror master plots that have plagued (generally) the 21st century in mediocrity and lackluster “imagination.” You will not understand the properties and visuals of the film, and maybe you are not supposed to. Hausu is much better digested as an admiration for the true darkness and surrealism that can lie within unrestricted thought and internal investigation, and how it can sometimes be beautiful.
Editorial written by: Drew Caruso
Last year’s Day 25 film: Rosemary’s Baby
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