The Last House, Penny Lane is Dead, Her Private Hell, and The Unearthly

This week, we’ve got three new releases and one campy classic. We’ll open with “The Last House,” which seems fairly polarizing with the critics. “Penny Lane is Dead” comes up second, with the very strange “Her Private Hell” up next. For an oldie, we’ll watch John Carradine in “The Unearthly” from 1957.

All this, plus the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #60, for September 2026, is out now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2026 The Last House

* Directed by: Louis Leterrier

* Written by: Matthew Robinson

* Stars: Greta Lee, Wagner Moura, Riley Chung

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 52 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A family of four is sealed in their house, along with everyone else in their houses apparently, and we get to watch them survive with the resources that they have on hand.

After seeing a lot of bad reviews and online hate for this movie, we were bracing ourselves for the worst. We were pleasantly surprised, and we both liked it. It’s got a lot of questionable points and unexplained things, but we were entertained.

Spoilery Synopsis

“Everyone remembers where they were when the rain came,” we are told. Everyone looks up at the weird-looking storm, as the voiceover gets pretty ominous. Credits roll.

Jason comes home from bad fishing, and he’s brought donuts to his wife Ann, and two kids, Ruth and Graham. The garage door and the electronic front door won’t open, and the kids are super whiny, and everyone talks over each other, so it’s gonna be bad. It must be a prank, right? The Internet is down, as are the cellphones. Even the glass in the window won’t break– it reforms and “heals” itself.

The neighbors across the street signal with a mirror that they can’t get out either. A jogger runs by, and they get her attention to go for help. They all wonder about conspiracy theories. Ruth thinks the rain did this. “The rain looked different today.”

Jason shows Ann his gun, and she freaks out. Night falls, and the rain continues. Jason tries to drill through the door, but the holes re-seal themselves. The rain is making some kind of barrier around the house, even underneath it.

No Internet. They dig out old DVDs and records to entertain the kids. They have power and water, but food is going to be limited. The dog, on the other hand, has to poop, so that’s a problem. Jason teaches the kids how to gut a fish, but they don’t have any fish.

After a week, some of the neighbors run out of food. After the second week, they’ve all adjusted to the new normal. After a month, Ruth notices something walking around outside in the rain, but no one believes her. Ann saves the seeds from their vegetables and starts growing more. Another month, and neighbors are dying, and they’re out of dog food.

One night, a crazy person with a knife beats on the doors and windows. “They’re dead! Everyone is dead!” Is that jogger from a long time ago, and she’s clearly gone insane. The rain itself tears her away from the window and drags her away. They all believe Ruth’s stories about rain-people now. It’s time to start covering up the windows.

The crappy old house is falling apart, especially the cracks in the chimney and foundation. Could they get out through the chimney? They hoist Ruth up through the chimney and she gets her hand through, but the hole is too small to get out completely.

The dog runs out of medicine and dies. What to do with the body? The fireplace… or the freezer? There are now big tentacle-monsters outside when it rains.

Three months, and all the food is gone. There’s a wild dog outside that keeps coming around, and Jason builds a trap that he sends out through the chimney to catch it. It takes a few attempts, but he eventually catches a squirrel. “Chimney fishing,” they all joke. They also expand the garden by pulling up the floor. Eventually, the power goes out.

Five years later, most of the house is garden. The kids have gotten much bigger. There are bears living in the street outside. The house is still sinking, and the cracks are getting worse. The monsters keep coming to the door, and they always hide from them. The monsters can open the door and come inside, but the people can’t open them. Something calls the monster away.

After the rain stops, the door still won’t open. The monster left a puddle of seawater behind, so Ruth figures the creatures are from our oceans, not outer space. It also kills most of their garden with the salt water. It poisons their soil and drinking water.

Ruth gets bitten by a weasel and gets infected. Jason figures out a way to dig down into the sewer pipes, and Ann volunteers to crawl through to the neighbor’s house to get antibiotics (Why would a retired dentist have antibiotics in their home that would have expired years ago?).

Ann makes it to the neighbors house and gets the drugs, but it starts to rain, and the monsters come out. It’s a chase through the sewer, but she escapes the tentacle-monster. The drugs heal Ruth just fine.

Jason tells Ann and the kids to hide in the attic, since the creature is going to come for them now; he’ll distract them. No, Ann and Graham want to run outside when the creature opens the door next time. Jason wants to go all “Home Alone” and just lure the creatures inside to a bunch of traps he’s made.

The creatures, on the other hand, have their own plan. They flood the house with water, filling it up entirely. There’s a crazy battle as the family makes their way up to the attic. The garage floor gives way and drains most of the house’s flooding. They finally get the best of the creature, trapping it alive. Jason remembers that Ruth thought it was friendly and doesn’t kill it. It opens the door for them and lets them all outside.

Outside, they are soon surrounded by other creatures, but the one they spared comes out and tells the others to leave them alone. Suddenly, the whole house collapses and falls down into a pit.

For some reason, the rain stops and the monsters all go away. The family takes a fishing boat and sails away since it’s “Waterworld” by this point.

Brian’s Commentary

I’m skeptical that there’s enough space in that house to garden food enough for four people.

I’ve read some really terrible reviews of this one, but I kinda liked it. It’s not really explained, and it probably doesn’t make a lot of sense if you think about any of it, but who wouldn’t want to be trapped inside their house for five years?

It’s not as bad as you may have heard.

Kevin’s Commentary

The Internet and cell service went out but electricity, gas, and water kept working just fine for longer than they should have if they were unattended. But that’s just one of the many unexplained issues and loose ends.

By the time they made their move to get out of the house, if the phenomenon was worldwide, it doesn’t seem like there would be a whole lot of other survivors left.

Basically my interpretation is that it was a race of ocean dwelling creatures with control over water, such as the creatures in “The Abyss,” that got fed up with the human race.

With as much online hate as I’ve seen for this movie, I was expecting to hate it myself. I did not. So much is unexplained and things best not to question too deeply. But I was entertained.

2026 Penny Lane is Dead

* Directed by: Mia Kate Russell

* Written by: Mia Kate Russell

* Stars: Sophia Wright-Mendelsohn, Tahlee Fereday, Alexandra Jensen

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Four young women join up at an isolated beach house for a celebration. When three bad guys show up, things take an assaulty, violent, and somewhat predictable turn. The movie takes place in 1986, which gives it a retro vibe. It’s well made, and there are enough variables to keep it interesting, but at the core it’s mostly something we’ve seen before.

Spoilery Synopsis

Australia, 1986. Kat and Nick are a couple, and she makes drug-laced cupcakes. Penny’s mother doesn’t trust Penny’s cousin, Kat, who drinks and does drugs. Credits roll.

Penny has Toni and Amy over for a “school’s out” party, and Penny’s mother finally leaves them alone. Penny and Toni kissed each other and liked it, but they don’t tell Amy, cause that’d be weird in 1986. They go to the liquor store and flirt with Nick and Josh.

Kat shows up and has custom cupcakes for each of them. It doesn’t take long before that and all the other drugs start to kick in, and Penny passes out. Kat admits that she drugged Penny’s for kicks. If they call the police, Penny might not be able to go to law school. Toni attacks Kat, and there is much arguing. Kat calls her boyfriend, Angus, to come and pick her up.

Angus wants to come inside to make a phone call, but Toni thinks he’s scary. Radowsky and Merrick are outside in the car as well. Against her better judgment, Toni lets them all inside. They’re obnoxious and a bit scary to Toni and Amy.

Toni figures that Kat will want to leave if she seduces Angus, which goes badly. In retaliation, Kat shows the men where Penny is passed out in the bedroom. This is quickly turning into Angus’s rape party, and Merrick wants to wait in the car, uninvolved. Kat, on the other hand, takes photos.

Penny wakes up, screaming, and Toni beats Radowsky into unconsciousness. Kat nags Angus into killing Penny with a shovel. Toni takes off in the car to get help, but Radowsky isn’t far behind. The store Toni goes to is closed, and the phone doesn’t work, but it does have a machete hanging on the wall. She knows how to use it, and soon Radowsky is in pieces.

Merrick and Angus argue about where they were supposed to go tonight. Important people were waiting for them. Angus’s father is important and lets Angus get away with anything.

Meanwhile, Amy steals the world’s slowest bicycle, and Angus chases her down on foot. He ends up shooting her.

Kat and Angus have sex while Merrick cleans up the bodies. Toni runs back from the store with the machete, but it’s a long way off.

Toni returns to the house and finds bodies; she missed the killings. She slashes Merrick, but he doesn’t die quietly– or quickly. Kat wants to kill Toni, and Angus gives her the chance, but even Angus starts to think Kat’s a lunatic.

Unexpectedly, Nick shows up, and Kat’s happy to see him. She’s covered in blood, so he immediately knows something is up. Nick sees too much and runs away. While Angus is out chasing him, Merrick gives Toni a knife to help her escape. When Angus kills Nick, Kat freaks out, because she liked Nick.

Toni cuts herself loose, grabs Angus’s gun, and shoots him. Merrick throws a knife to finish him off.

Now it’s just Toni and Kat in a … Katfight. Josh shows up, looking for Nick, and he finds Toni stuck to the window with a knife. He releases her, but he doesn’t live long after that. Kat and Toni get back at it, and it gets pretty bloody– cheese grater bloody!

It’s all looking pretty bad for Toni until Penny wakes up, not dead after all, and whacks Kat with a shovel. They ride off in the morning, leaving Kat and the others at the house.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s an Australian home invasion story. Since it’s 1986, there aren’t any cell phones, which is convenient for the killers.

So Toni is just fine in the morning after getting all those stab wounds? Doubtful. Still, it’s a bloody mess with a twist at the end, so it was pretty decent.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was kind of bored in the beginning when we were getting to know the four girls, but things picked up when the guys showed up. Well, a while after the guys show up. But it gets more interesting eventually.

I was thinking 1986 wasn’t so long ago, then I remembered that’s 40 years. It gave it a retro vibe plus took the element of cell phones out of the story.

It’s just another women suffering through a home invasion story, but it’s well made and still pretty entertaining.

2026 Her Private Hell

* Directed by: Nicolas Winding Refn

* Written by: Nicholas Winding Refn, Esti Giordani

* Stars: Sophie Thatcher, Charles Melton, Havana Rose Liu

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The IMDB.com description says, “A hypnotic, unhinged thriller with an original story promising plenty of glamour, sex, and violence.” which is useful to use because I’d have no idea how to describe it exactly. It’s surreal and futuristic, with dialogue that is deliberately stilted and odd. It looks great, and there’s sort of a story there to be deciphered. Watch it for the visuals, then wonder afterward what it is you just saw.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a shadowy, misty, futuristic city with lots of cyberpunk elements (Kevin called it “the Blade Runner planet” right off the bat). At the Tower Hotel, Elle looks up at the neon tower. Inside, she meets Hunter, and they have some clunky dialogue. They go up to Elle’s apartment, and it’s super huge. Dominique comes in and gives them a lecture about not being relatable. Dominique turns out to be Elle’s stepmother.

We flash over to her father, Johnny Thunders, who is powerful and likes to play games with people. There’s a whole scene with models, dresses, needles, and discussion about the mist and what it brings. Johnny tells the girls about the Leatherman, a father cursed to search for his daughter in the mist. Hunter is fascinated by the older man, who wants Elle and Dominique to make up and be friends again– by making a movie together.

Elle and Hunter watch as someone in the neighboring building is murdered.

We cut to Elle aboard a starship that enters some kind of vortex that makes her pass out. She gets into a laser battle with a bunch of fembots but gets shot in the arm. I assume this is the “movie” they were supposed to be making. Suddenly, Hunter tells them about the Leatherman story again, and it’s all true. She tells them about a pair of women, The Kingmakers, who are the guides for the Leatherman.

Elle goes home and finds that her father has left her a hatchet and a note to bury the hatchet, literally. [At this point, we’re 35 minutes in, and I really have no idea what’s going on or why].

We cut to “Private K,” a man with a cigarette lighter. “I saw the Leatherman,” he explains. “I saw him take my daughter. Is he a ghost? A monster? A god?” He talks to a detective who learns that K recently lost his daughter to a kidnapper when the mist came.

He hears a scream and runs toward it to help, where he knocks out a guy with his brass knuckles. He breaks up a whole trafficking/photography thing out in an alley somewhere. It’s all very colorful and violent. The police arrest him for killing all the perpetrators. The police then take off K’s shirt and whip him; meanwhile, Elle moans “Daddy” in her sleep over and over.

Elle, Dominique, and Hunter bark like dogs to each other and then go out for the evening to meet Nico, a guy they all know. They talk about fetal art. Hunter tells him all about the Leatherman as well.

Private K talks more about his lost daughter, and I strongly suspect that it’s going to be Elle when she was a child (could Johnny Thunders be the Leatherman? Who could see THAT coming?) He talks to the Kingmakers, who tell him that he’s just a memory. They explain that he will see his daughter again, but only when he dies. The yakuza show up and beat up K, but he kills them all, unarmed.

Dominique and Elle have a long conversation about being former and future friends. The two of them, along with Hunter, go to the least crowded rave I’ve ever seen. Maybe Private K is there. Nico is there, and he kisses everyone, and they all kiss each other as K watches from outside.

K tries to break in as someone, I think Hunter, gets her chest ripped open (I’m not sure who it was, I was too busy looking up synonyms for “pretentious”).

Elle then goes home to her apartment above the mist and makes out with Dominique. No, she stuffs underwear in Dominique’s mouth. This leads to a full-on fight with knives and everything. Elle goes for the hatchet.

Suddenly, the Leatherman arrives, and he silences Dominique. Trapped, Elle waits to see who the Leatherman turns out to be. Since there are only two men in the film, it’s not much of a debate. The demonic Leatherman fights Private K dramatically. K loses, but then Elle cuts off the Leatherman’s hands with the hatchet. Characters give long, lingering looks at the camera and then vanish, leaving Elle alone in the mist.

The Kingmakers appear to choose her fate. They give her some magic gloves.

Brian’s Commentary

That the hell was that all about?

It’s extremely visual, most scenes seem composed for the sake of visual art instead of any kind of rational story. There are some ideas here, but they’re barely connected and the overall plot is dragged out that it’s just boring as anything.

This “mist” needed more extradimensional monsters. That would have livened it up.

It’s a self-indulgent, pretentious waste of two hours. If you’re really into cinematography and art, go for it. If you want a story, stay far, far away.

As Kevin says, “Yeah, that happened.”

Kevin’s Commentary

Brian said, “This is what you get if you let the cameraman write a movie,” and I thought that was spot on. Lots of long lingering shots and strangeness and camera work that look great but don’t really mean anything. It’s like the visuals and imagery and surrealism came first, then a sort of loose story was inserted around that.

“Nicolas Winding Refn (the director) said the story originated from combining three separate ideas: a young woman arriving in a city that does not exist, a man willing to descend into Hell to rescue his daughter, and a third narrative thread created specifically to connect the first two into a “triangle” structure.” Well alrighty then.

It was pretty to look at, but the near-two hour run time started feeling long for me well before the halfway point. I wouldn’t recommend it.

1957 The Unearthly

* Directed by: Boris Petroff

* Written by: Jane Mann, John D.F. Black

* Stars: John Carradine, Myron Healey, Allison Hayes

* Run Time: 1 Hours, 13 Minutes

* Watch It:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A mad scientist obsessed with glands experiments with the patients in his isolated psychiatric institute and laboratory. And despite the title, everything happens unEarthly. It’s not awful, but it’s pretty basic and forgettable. Neither of us were very impressed.

Spoilery Synopsis

After the credits, Dr. Wright and Grace come to visit Dr. Charles Conway. The huge servant, Lobo, lets them in and looks creepy. Conway runs a sanitarium, and he’s accepted Grace as a new patient. Conway hears about Grace’s father and gets nervous, but Dr. Wright says he’s arranged for her to be discovered as a suicide; no one’s going to come looking for her.

Conway’s been experimenting on people and suspended animation. He’s got Jedrow in the basement who’s not much better than a zombie. Jedrow has a sister who’s been trying to find him, which is a problem.

Lobo catches a man skulking around outside and drags him inside to Conway. He’s Mark Hueston, and Conway knows that he’s a wanted killer. Conway makes a deal with him. He won’t turn Mark Houston in if Houston works for him.

Time passes, and Danny and Natalie argue about breakfast. They’re patients, and they’ve been here for months. Danny’s aggressive, but Dr. Sharon sedates him.

Conway has the secret of life, death, and growth; it’s all done through glands. Lobo was a tiny man when he arrived here, but now he’s a huge man. He’s developed a new, artificial gland that will prolong life. Mark thinks the doctor is crazy but has no choice but to stay.

Mark makes friends with Grace. Conway tells Natalie that she’s got a “special treatment” coming up. Dr. Sharon and Lobo drug her and send her to Conway’s lab while the others are distracted by Conway’s organ music. In the surgery, Conway implants the gland inside Natalie and sews her back up.

Meanwhile, Mark searches Natalie’s room, since he suspects something is wrong. He goes to Grace’s room and wants to take her away from all this.

Eight hours later, Conway goes in to check on Natalie, who should have awakened by now. Turns out, she’s aged tremendously in those hours; it didn’t work at all. He then warns Grace to stay away from Mark, who’s a troublemaker. This makes Sharon jealous, and she wants to make Grace their next subject.

Mark starts snooping around in the basement and finds Jedrow, who still just sits there. He brings Grace down to see him, but by that point, Jedrow is gone. They do find Natalie, who’s a decrepit mess now. Meanwhile, Lobo has hauled Jedrow out back in a coffin and is digging a hole to bury him. Mark sees him doing it. He goes to Danny and warns him about what the doctor is up to. They hatch a plan for them to meet at 2 am and the two of them with Grace will escape.

There’s lots of running up and down the stairs as the doctor checks to make sure his trio of patients are sleeping. The three of them meet in the lobby at 2, but the doctor catches them. Sharon, Lobo, and the doctor all have guns so they have little choice but to go back upstairs. They take Grace for a gland implant. The two guys are left with Lobo, and they take advantage of his slow wits to escape. Danny gets shot as Mark confronts Conway.

Mark reveals himself as an undercover policeman, here to stop Conway, but Conway escapes in the dark. Jedrow gets out of the grave and stabs Conway. Lobo then kills Jedrow. The police arrive in time to arrest Sharon and Lobo. The police also find a room full of animal-men in the basement that we had no idea about before this. “What if they do live forever?” asks one of the cops.

Mark and Grace laugh at their good luck. He offers to take her home, and they kiss.

Brian’s Commentary

This was completed in only six days. Wow. It’s not especially good, but it doesn’t feel rushed.

It’s a very standard mad-scientist film with a very standard plot. There’s nothing supernatural or “unearthly” about anything here.

It’s not very good.

Kevin’s Commentary

I can see how it could have been done in six days if the cast and crew was on top of things. There aren’t many very complicated scenes or special effects.

It was kind of tame with not much originality to offer. It’s not bad, but I’d put it low on the classics scale. I didn’t hate it, but I’d rate it a mid that I’d never need to see again.

Short Film:

2026 Short Film: Black Coffee

* Directed by: Muzappar Osman

* Written by: Muzappar Osman

* Stars: Nobody real, it’s entirely AI

* Run Time: 4:41

* Watch it:

What Happens

An AI representation of a woman coming home after losing her job to AI discovers something very special about her mug of coffee. It’s a portal. And when the opening isn’t big enough, she finds a way around that. It’s heavy on science fiction and low on horror, but it tells a story that has an unsettling tone.

Commentary

There’s a disclaimer that it’s AI if you notice it, but you can tell by the short scenes - a current limit of AI, the general look of it, and the gibberish visual text here and there. And the story seems like it was written by AI trying to convince us that AI and technology heading the way it is is a good thing and nothing to be afraid of. Brian thought it was okay. Kevin was not impressed. Posted 12 days ago at the time of this writing and at 88,000 plus views. Sigh.

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