Saw The House, which is a piece of film on Netflix that Netflix presents as a movie but which is confusingly listed as a TV show on imdb. Whatever this thing is, it's currently a trio of stop-motion animated short films about people being consumed by their house. I think it's supposed to be the same house, but it might not be - it's not part of the plot really.
The first short is about the house's creation and was amazing. I like films that are animated and I like stories about evil houses, so I was expecting greatness and this first film delivered: changing hallways, obsessive exploration, Faustian deviltry - it has it all! The film is a cautionary tale about the pursuit of status as symbolized by the house. We follow a poor family who agree to let a wealthy man build a house on their land and in exchange must live in the house. As the house grows around them and their mysterious benefactor gains control, they lose sight of themselves and their roots. A chilly little story which I enjoyed immensely.
The second film was about a mouse-man who is working on rehabilitating the house with the end goal of flipping it. Unfortunately, the house has become infested with fur beetles (fictional creatures which seem to be animal-world analogues for bed bugs or something.) Despite his best efforts to keep the house looking fancy and impressive, things keep breaking and the fur beetles keep showing up. Again, there's some delicious obsession on display, however I couldn't help but feel bad for the increasingly desperate main character, which sort of spoiled the fun. The theme here I think is of parasitism. The main mouse guy is trying to find some wealthy family to profit off of his labor, but is instead stuck with lowlier vermin who are far more appreciative of his work.
The final film follows a cat-woman who now owns the house. Some sort of disaster has left the world covered in slowly-rising water, except for the hill-top upon which the house sits. The cat-woman has a dream of refurbishing the house so she can live in it. Alas, she's living in the past, both literally (in an ancient house) and figuratively (ie: living as though world were not water-logged). This story is about her moving on and learning to grow with the world, accepting instead of fighting change. I felt this was the weakest of the three films, but it is the most positive and thus logical to end on.
The trio of films taken together were a little disappointing to me. I hoped they would all be like the first short: sinister and full of twisting, ever-changing, inscrutable hallways and architecture. They became more gentle as they went on though, the last one being almost folksy. It was alright, but fell somewhat short of my expectations.
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