Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967)

A couple of years ago I purchased a DVD called the 50 worst films ever made.  While I think there were some deserving movies left off their list I did decide to track down and watch all the movies from the list that I hadn’t seen yet.  Why you might ask?  I suppose I’m a glutton for punishment or maybe just really stupid.  Either way this gem was on that list and so I sat down the other night and forced my way thru it.

So you have a couple of country “stars” named Boots Malone and Woody Wetherby headed on down to Nashville for a hoedown or something with their manager Jeepers along for the trip.  They decide to stop somewhere for the night and since there aren’t any hotels they think that a spooky old mansion is a fine substitute.  What they don’t know is that the house is haunted.  Well okay not really.  It is actually being used by secret agents to spy on the nearby missile base and is rigged to make everyone think it is haunted to keep them away.  Boots, Woody, and Jeepers picked the wrong night to stay as the place is crawling with government agents trying to catch the spies, the spies themselves, and a gorilla that has escaped it’s cage.  Oh wait and there is actually a ghost.  Toss in a ton of really bad country music and you have Hillbillys in a Haunted House.

There really isn’t much of a story here.  Basically the movie is a series of tired old gags from the 30s and 40s tied together loosely with a silly cold war inspired spy ring.  Imagine if you will a 3 Stooges short stretched out to feature length without any of the funny stuff, one musical number after another, and that is pretty much Hillbillys in a Haunted House.  I suppose if you dig old school country music then you might get some enjoyment out of this movie (especially the ending – more on that later) but I’m not a fan.  This means the only reason I had left was to watch veteran actors Basil Rathbone, Lon Chaney Jr., and John Carradine struggle thru some of the most embarrassingly bad dialogue and situations that I’ve ever seen.  I was very sad to see them reduced to playing 2nd fiddle to country music singers in such a poorly conceived movie.  Still there are a few moments to watch for, especially between Carradine and Rathbone who have some on screen chemistry.  Unfortunately Chaney basically gets to make nice with the man in the gorilla suit and not much else. 

The movie is 88 minutes long and each second of it drags along at a snails pace.  Really this was a tough one to get thru.  Though the last 15 minutes of the movie is a series of musical numbers that you can fast forward thru, thank god.  The most shocking thing about Hillbillys in a Haunted House is that it is a sequel to Hillbillys in Las Vegas.  Now I have to track down and watch the movie that could have spawned such a thing as this.  I don’t recommend this movie, but it would have a difficult time cracking my 50 worst movies ever made list. 

½ out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer

© Copyright 2010 John Shatzer