Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Deep House’ on Hulu, a Good Ol’ Haunted House Movie, Except This Time, the House is Underwater

Now on Hulu, The Deep House is the latest horror outing from French filmmakers Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, notable for directing a prequel nobody asked for, 2017’s Leatherface. Thankfully, this new film carries the promise of an old premise with a twist: two dopes traipsing through a haunted house, except it’s at the bottom of a lake. Now let’s see if the execution of this idea holds water, or is just waterlogged.

THE DEEP HOUSE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Ben (James Jagger, son of Mick) and Tina (Camille Rowe) are worse than YouTubers – they’re amateur YouTubers, which means they don’t really make any money doing it, and also, they’re obnoxious tryhards desperate for LIKES. Yes, YIKES, and it’s especially true for Ben, who, unlike the rest of the world, thinks he’s really funny, especially when he’s making Tina freak out while the camera runs, or films her squatting in a field to take a pee. Healthy relationship you’ve got there, Ben and Tina. Makes you want to sit the poor girl down for a long talk.

Yet, they have the dough to go to Ukraine for their series of videos in which they poke around old abandoned buildings – and to buy what appears to be tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of scuba equipment, including a submersible drone-camera they’ve named Tom, as in “peeping tom, someone who likes to watch,” Tina helpfully explains. They must come from rich families. Anyway, Ben and Tina learn about a few houses that lie drowned in a lake, and trek to the “secret” locale, only to find it noisy with boaters and picnicking families and tourists. Well, shit. But then, a local chap named Pierre (Eric Savin) who’s only, like, 85 percent creepy takes them to see the real shit, a truly secret house under a secret part of the lake accessible after a secret drive and a secret hike through a secret woods, and beyond that, Ben is certain, lies a secret treasure trove of LIKES.

And oh boy, is this soggy domicile a dilly of a doozy. It boasts a private mausoleum, floating baby dolls, mannequins, guns, paintings of people holding guns, taxidermy, weirdly non-deteriorated electronics, occult decor, a life-size crucifix in the kitchen, a canopy bed with billowing curtains, an old piano that might be playing itself, things that go bumpity and many other surprises that really aren’t surprises, because we knew exactly what type of movie this would be when we sat down to watch it. The home’s only living resident is a big catfish, and I say that to imply that there may be DEAD residents there, you know, maybe some Cannibalistic Humanoid Underwater Dwellers! And here’s hoping, if only one of our intrepid protagonists makes it out, the one who doesn’t is dickhead Ben, but hey, NO SPOILERS.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: That video of a New York City woman who found a secret apartment behind her mirror. Also, it has some Saw torture vibes, some Evil Dead basement vibes and some Texas Chainsaw Massacre family vibes, except all of those vibes are underwater.

Performance Worth Watching: Let’s take this opportunity to shout-out the diver stand-ins for Jagger and Rowe, Justin and Thibault Rauby, who do a lot of heavy lifting here.

Memorable Dialogue: When a big fish bursts through an open window, startling poor Tina, Ben blurts, “Jump scares get the maximum likes!”

Sex and Skin: None. Too hard to f— underwater.

Our Take: Hey, at least instead of featuring characters walking… slowly… through… the house… and… IT’S ONLY A CAT, The Deep House features characters swimming… slowly… through… a house… and… IT’S ONLY A CATFISH. I’m pretty sure that’s the movie giving us an elbow nudge to tell us that it’s aware of itself. Don’t judge it for that, however – such moments are few, and the film ultimately gives a moribund subgenre a little life. Besides, the annoying fact that the movie’s ever so slightly meta is far less annoying than the Ben character, who’s so annoying in his desperate-to-go-viral casually-cruel-to-his-girlfriend manner, you’ll hope he gets devoured by the catfish in a moment of delicious bottom-feeder-eating-another-bottom-feeder irony – or worse, as it may or may not turn out, I’m not telling!

Technically, the movie is a considerable achievement. The underwater photography amplifies the murky, claustrophobic atmosphere, and Bustillo and Maury thankfully didn’t feel compelled to stick with handheld-cam/found footage POVs. Watching the two principals and their drone navigate the submerged house is disorienting enough to amplify the tension, yet isn’t so discombobulating that it pushes us out of the moment. And set design and props that would be mundane in a non-underwater haunted house movie enjoy a fresh, eerie glow here.

The film gets threadbare at times: Moments toward the end are chewed up by frenzied editing, the plot doesn’t adhere to anything resembling logic and it leans on the old countdown-to-drowning suspense mechanism that’s built into any thriller prominently featuring a scuba tank. Oh, and one scene in which Tina repeatedly shrieks BEN! BEN! BEN! tries to outdo Titanic at its Kate/Leo JACK! ROSE! JACK! wet-people-shouting game. Difference is, in Titanic, the male lead didn’t inspire in us a serious case of influencer schadenfreude.

Our Call: STREAM IT. The Deep House is modest enough to forego arthouse-horror subtext, aiming for conventional scares. But it’s ambitious enough to invigorate an old formula, and it mostly succeeds.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.