User reviews

If it's a dose of graphic old school gore you're after then Home Sick, with its regular and excessive scenes of non-CGI carnage, definitely delivers the goods: feet are sliced, heads are crushed, fingernails are torn out, teeth are smashed in, bodies are cleaved in two.

It's the stuff between the splatter that takes the film down a notch or two.

Writer E.L. Katz and director Adam Wingard have taken an offbeat approach with their storytelling, and the cast perform accordingly, putting in some decidedly strange performances; the result is a head-scratchingly bizarre movie at times, equal parts sadistic horror, wacky splat-stick, low-brow comedy, and avant-garde art-house weirdness, an awkward mixture that is certainly memorable, but not always that easy to digest.

Bill Moseley hams it up as a creepy stranger with a suitcase full of razor blades; Tiffany Shepis rolls around manically in her dead mother's blood; Tom Towles slaps his thighs as his son and his friends play with an assortment of firearms: occasionally the silliness works, but at other times it's just too eccentric for its own good.

Home Sick is worth watching simply for all the lovely red stuff—and Shepis getting her norks out (again)—but it's certainly not for everyone.

I really enjoyed this movie. I thought the cinematography was pretty stunning as well. I didn't understand the whole movie at a few parts,so I think editing could have been a little better, but it was still a great film. I was really impressed with Mosley's performance, as always, as well as Lindley Evans who appears to be a newbie. Hope we see more of her. I'll finish in saying that I saw it at a film festival, but I haven't heard much about it since, which is somewhat of a disappointment. I'd like to know when and where it will be available. Does anyone know?

Edited for length

I love the way this movie works. The story, the actors, the writing is all fantastic. I don't like slasher movies but this one is funny as hell and smart. Its also crazy. Just the right mix of sex, drugs, blood and funny creepy people. Mr. Suitcase is scary as hell. I wish more movie were this much fun to watch. It will hold you to your seat from start to finish. See this movie......or DIE!!!!!!

Adam Wingard's HomeSick is a treat, but only if you can stomach some truly jarring moments of gore and have one demented sense of humour with the capacity for.. let's just say… abstract thought. Low budget, practical effects driven schlockers like these are a dime a dozen, but this one is worth it's weight in gold simply for going that extra mile to make it memorable and stand out from the cheaply drawn masses. It starts out slow, with an eerie opening credit jingle that could suggest all kinds of horrors to come. We meet a group of friends going through the motions of partying and quarreling. Tiffany Shepis does a wonderfully nutty little riff on her scream queen shtick as a positively slutty little minx who likes to rail cocaine at her graveyard job and swing a mop around with gale force. Anywho, this weird little troupe is kicking back one night, when into the apartment walks a very ill adjusted stranger named Mr. Suitcase (the legendary Bill Moseley), and sits down on the couch like he owns the place. He's chipper, charming and affable to a terrifying level, as he opens up his suitcase full of razor blades that he calls "gifts". He asks them all to pick one person in their life they hate and want to wish dead, slicing a nasty gash on his forearm for each answer. The seemingly autistic member of the group (Forrest Pitts, in a priceless performance of comedic eccentricities) foolishly blurts out that he wishes everyone in the room dead, and then the real fun begins. A giant masked killer begins stalking and killing pretty much every character around in ways so brutal your balls will shrink into your pancreas. Seriously, it's like they sat down in a boardroom and systematically came up with every squirm inducing way to inflict violence on a human body, and gave their results to the storyboard artist and effects team. It all comes to a chaotic, deranged finale when they take refuge with Uncle Johnnie (the late great Tom Towles, always brilliant) a gun toting chili enthusiast. That's where the film comes off the rails, but it's seemingly deliberate and actually quite hilarious, as everyone pretty much goes feral and loses the plot all at once like a coked up kindergarten class in overdrive. There's some thought and care put into the writing, and as such the characters, however odd or over the top, seem like real people, albeit some strange and undesirable folks. The film oozes unsettling atmosphere right from the get-go, fervent in its aggressively weird sense of style and never taking the conventional route that most horrors end up with. Like I said, if your sense of humour has an affinity for the bizarre, demented and off the wall (think Tim & Eric meets The Evil Dead meets John Waters), you're gonna love this little gem. On top of being a laugh riot, it's just freaky enough to earn it's horror classification, something which many films in the genre just can't claim. As to why it's called HomeSick, though? Couldn't tell you, and there's no reference to it the entire time. Perhaps it's called that for the normies, the folks who watch it expecting a run of the mill, cookie cutter slasher and feel uncomfortable with the oddness, getting "home sick" for their bland fare. As for me, I'm right at home up the weird end of the alley, and love this type of thing. I hope you do to.

I recently caught Home Sick on a whim at the Sidewalk Film Festival. I expected an average, post-90's low budget horror film. What I saw was a well-polished, deeply disjointing, gore-fest. Seemingly taking cues from horror masters Tobe Hooper, Dario Argento, and Lucio Fulci, Home Sick pays genuine respect to the slowly-rotting slasher genre, while adding a breath of fresh air to it as well.

Set somewhere in Alabama, Claire (Lindley Evans) comes home from California to visit her mysterious past. When visiting her friends, no one seems welcoming. This tension becomes more agitated when she and her acquaintances are confronted by Bill Moseley's (!) character, a big-grinning, blue-suited stranger who happens to carry a suitcase full of razor blades. After performing a bizarre blood-letting ritual based on the kids' hatred for others, he calmly exits. Panic, murder, hysteria, sex, drugs, guns, and chili dinners ensue.

The level of gross in this movie far exceeds anything that's come out in the mainstream since the days of Romero. Instances of broken bones, ripped-off flesh, disembowelment, and knives in the head plague this film. It's not just the gore that makes it special, but also the characters' involvement with death. This is best conveyed in a scene with a coked-out Candice (Tiffany Shepis) and her recently butchered mother. This scene is worth a review in itself.

Besides the first class gore effects, the characters add a certain dynamic to the film. Whereas most teen / young adult horror films revolve around a cast that is pulled from stereotypical high-schoolers (The Jock, The Geek, The Face, etc.), Home Sick incorporates kids that already seem pretty crazy. For fun, they sit around drinking beer and watching gory films like Evil Dead Trap 2. They look pale and have dark circles around their eyes-even the redneck kids. They work at places like the bowling alley, the funeral home, and the school cafeteria. When it hits the fan, these characters seem like they've been preparing for it all their lives. For example, a creepy guy approaches Candice and shows her a Polaroid of a curb-jaw victim he discovered. Her response is a brilliantly sarcastic `Oooh, gross.'

Due to the intense violence, there's absolutely no way this film could be showed at the local Cineplex, unless it's linked to some sort of festival. I can only hope that this comes out on video as it is a testament to real independent filmmaking.

HOME SICK is about a party where this weird man in a blue suit shows up(walking in an extremely creepy way in which he seems to be on a skateboard or some type of cart) with a suitcase filled with thousands of razor blades. He asks the people at the party who each of them hate, and for every answer he slices his wrist with a different razor blade. After he has finished asking everyone, he stands up sings a song and then leaves. Soon after he leaves, everyone who was named begins dying in very bizarre and horrific ways. The characters quickly come to the rather unbelievable conclusion that is is all because of the man in the blue suit, and since one of the people at the party listed off everyone that was in the house, the fates of all the characters are at stake. This may sound like a weird premise for a horror film, but trust me. It works.

What I loved most about this film is that it didn't feel like a modern horror film. This film is probably about as close as a modern day horror film can ever come to replicating the style, atmosphere, music, characters, and gore of a 70s horror film. It comes off so impressively and so beautifully that you feel nostalgic just watching it. I wish that more horror films these days could be more like HOME SICK. The opening scene in the bathroom is a perfect example of a scene right out of something like I DRINK YOUR BLOOD or a Dario Argento film. It comes off so effectively and with such imagination. There's no CGI gore. It's all practical visual effects. They work absolutely perfect.

The performances come off good in a realistic way. The characters in this film are all completely psychotic and insane and their psychosis comes off all too real at times, particularly toward the end when certain events are depicted in such a gritty and guerrilla-style way about them. The music in this is absolutely perfect in setting a dark tone, completely with a sense of eerie detachment and weirdness that feels entirely appropriate. Again, it's just like something Tobe Hooper would have done. The intense atmosphere just fits perfect with the film's style.

In terms of complaints I had for the film, I did find the middle of the film to be a bit slow and moody in a way that came off slightly awkward. I liked it, but I can imagine many horror fans feeling a little bored. I also didn't really particularly like any of the characters, but considering how they are all insane I suppose that was the point. I don't know, it's difficult to really complain about this film since everything is done so deliberately. If you love the bizarre and cheap horror films of the early 70s like the ones I mentioned above, I am really confident that you will love this film. It's a must-see for horror fans for sure. Check it out.

I haven't seen it in a while. Let me think if I can cook up some words for it. I know that I am going to review it once Synapse releases it. I loved Bill Mosely's performance. Its a bizarre and gory acid trip. The blood is thick and its too weird to be predictable. Its not by any means conventional but thats what kept my mind on the movie after I watched it. There's stuff for fans of brainless splatter entertainment and a wacky/ artsy vibe that should appeal to art-house fans that can accept some thing low brow. It's a psychedelic slasher thats more original than typical but impossible to describe. The ending is wacky!

Synapse should be putting this out on DVD sometime this year!

Bill Moseley portrays the Suitcase Man, who crashes a party of twenty somethings and asks each of them, who is one person they hate and would like to see dead. His suitcase is full of razor blades, btw. Pretty upset that old Suitcase stopped in and a little scared, they all give him a name, but one guy makes the mistake of naming the whole bunch at the party should die (the guy is an idiot, and was just being a dick). Soooooooo, not only do the people they named start to end up in ultra gory deaths, but the whole group is now under siege from a creepy superhuman death machine. This is a film that could have been made by Herschell Gordon Lewis, and would be a gore classic. The gore effects are pretty cheap, but effective, and the story is pretty original. After several deaths have all ready occurred, the head goofball, decides the best place for the survivors to go to fight off the killer, is with Uncle Johnny (Tom Towles) who is a chili connoisseur, and also has a house full of many many weapons. This is a seventies style slasher movie, but with a real attitude, and way over the top on just about every level. All I can say, is "Home Sick" could have been a Masters of Horror 2-part episode, and might have been the best one. Very very gross, extremely and I mean extremely gory, and a good sense of humour that gives a wink and a nod to gorehounds. Take a look at the reviews at IMDb, and they all pretty much agree with me, that this is a must-have. Although Moseley's role is pretty small, he is highly effective in his usually creepy self. But most of the kudos go to Tom Towles, in one of his best and funniest roles ever. If you don't like small independent productions operating on a shoestring, but making the most out of every nickel, you should probably stay away, because this is for the fans that consider H G Lewis, the Godfather of Gore, and would love see more of his brand of gore films. "Home Sick" is his brand of gore, and mine too.

The DVD is great, and has a commentary which I expect to watch tonight. It should be a hoot.

An enigmatic and seemingly psychotic stranger (Bill Moseley) crashes a home-coming get together among some friends in Alabama. Brandishing a suitcase full of razorblades, he demands that everyone at the party give him the name of someone that they truly despise, which they very reluctantly do, but when they people named begin to die the friends become fearful for their own lives because one of them made a flippant comment at the party. Now they have to come up with a plan to survive, with the help of a chili-loving redneck gun enthusiast (Tom Towles).

Aside from Moseley and Towles, the acting from most of the others is pretty dire (Especially Matt Lero as Timmy, who seems content to channel Eric Freeman's 'acting chops' as Ricky from Silent Night Deadly Night 2). However this is easily overlooked as the movie is more or less just so much gory, weird fun and left me impressed.

Eye Candy: XZanthia and an extra get topless and make out; Tiffany Shepis also loses her shirt

My Grade: B-

DVD Extras: Commentary with Director Adam Wingard and writer/ producer E. L. Katz; deleted opening sequence; Bill Mosley interview segment; 'In a room where darkness counts' featurette; and 3 short films ("the Girlfriend", "1,000 year sleep" & "Laura Panic")

I was extremely surprised to see how well done Home Sick was. Not only as a horror film, but in its presentation and its development as any film. Adam Wingard is a young director and you can tell a huge horror and film fan. This film will give you an idea of how great a fairly low budget film can be. I went in thinking it would be more of a thriller. I was thrilled to find out it was a true slasher gore fest. I was laughing uncontrollably. The movie was packed with great special effects and once the story develops, it is a real fun and entertaining film. The cinematography and sound effects were also really impressive. I can't wait to see what this team of filmmakers will come up with next. I really believe Home Sick is a truly entertaining and well done horror film.

I thought Home Sick was sensational!! Tiffany was fantastic & sexy as always, as was Bill Moseley. Bill is so creepy as Mr Suitcase, you'll have nightmares for weeks. Lots of blood, gore, and more blood. The special effects are awesome!! Jonathan Thornton has come up with his best effects yet. Scared the crap out of me more times than I can count. Will Akers shows his stuff here with an unforgettable character that left me wanting to see more of him. The scene in the diner will leave you howling! Tom Towles kicks a**!! I'll never be able to eat another bowl of chili without seeing him! The music is also sensational. Homesick is definitely worth the wait!! Can't wait to see what else the writer and director will come up with.

I just reviewed a rough copy of this film "I did say rough copy". I think this is a true slasher film "100%". I do think however that slasher fans will be the only ones who understand and appreciate this film. Slasher fans will be very excited once this hits video shelves. For the budget that was given I think the production level looks great. It seems the writer and director meant for this to be an all out slasher feast. There are some very comical characters that are so nuts that they are truly frightening. People who watch this film need to be aware that the gore is VERY HEAVY. I have not seen this much gore in a independent film in a long time. Some of the gore scenes will make your bones tingle.

Characters "My Favorite Characters" that will catch your attention: Mr. Suitcase-- "Bill great motivational speaker" Devin-- "Truly Funny redneck character that is in a weird way Scary" Uncle Johnny-- "Great redneck outlaw TOM!"

Slasher fans get ready for HOME SICK because it is a non stop roller-coaster of gore and wild characters.

Have fun!

Before Adam Wingard directed big Hollywood features like Death Note Remake and Godzilla vs. Kong, his first feature was called Home Sick...

Home Sick is an underrated cult classic low budget passionate slasher modern masterpiece... It features Horror Icons Tiffany Shepis bathing in blood as Candice, the late great Tom Towles who's unhinged as Uncle Johnny and Bill Moseley who's crazily hilarious as Mr. Suitcase...

This movie is so much fun, it has everything an old school horror fan would want... Great gore, amazing 80s score from Zombi, crazy and wacky characters and even a demon from hell...

Adam Wingard maybe be working on big budget Hollywood features right now but Home Sick will always be the one that true horror fans will never forget!

WOW!

This film delivered the goods in every way possible, especially when you consider the fact that it was produced on a low budget. The film has excellent special effects on make up with the "slasher" and the gore factor is enough to make any viewer cringe numerous times!

In all due respect, "Mr. Suitcase" was strange, as was the Militia Chili-cooker dude, but they were fun in a twisted way. And every other character was performed in a way where you'd have a hard time LIKING them.

If you're up for something new and enjoyable, then check out this movie!

Mega-thumbs up to the filmmakers for a job VERY WELL done!

And the bonus features on the DVD release are totally cool, especially the short films. I'd like to see what these guys would do with a bigger budget.

9 out of 10.

This movie is incredible. Humble, hilarious, unfiltered and smart. You have wicked exploitation elements, smart writing, classy young actors, weird stuff, funny stuff and gore. Gritty, old-school... Homesick reminded me how much fun exploitation horror movies are.

(This movie is very gory. Somehow it all seems in good fun though...) (Bill Moseley is a very good actor.) (Where did they get the rest of these actors? I feel like I have not seen this caliber of acting in a film on this budget before. Really refreshing to see some original behavior in this genre.) (Keep your eyes on these filmmakers, they know what we want...)

Quite dark and riveting at times, "Home Sick" sells it's story with extremely graphic gore tactics from the get-go...

Written by E.L. Katz and directed by Adam Windgard, this is Indie film making custom-made for those who crave the red stuff... And lots of it! The viewer is drawn in from the opening scene, which is quite perverse and filled with an underlying feeling of dread. Soon there after, we are treated to some gut splattering, puss spewing, limb launching fun like I have not seen in some time. With solid acting by everyone involved, "Home Sick" delivers a well crafted peek into a hideous Alabama sub-culture, where day to day life appears dreadful enough without an added demonic force ripping people's heads off... The pacing is okay for the most part, however there were a few (un-needed) slower scenes that didn't seem to be plot related. This is easily over-looked because the very next scene may contain a fountain of entrails, just to liven things up. "Home Sick" is a worth while addition to any Indie Horror collection.

The first time I saw this film, I was a bit confused. Then someone explained to me that the movie was dream-like intentionally, kinda like a David Lynch in hell type of thing. Upon re-watching the movie, I enjoyed it much, much more. Everything made much more sense, when you understand that you are gazing into someones death-dream. I was blown away by it the second time around, although I still had to watch many scenes thru my fingers. The gore was very convincing, almost too convincing. Beware everybody, this film is for those with strong stomachs. I thought the parts that were supposed to be funny, were VERY funny. I laughed out loud a few times. The ending, unlike Eli Roth's claim for Hostel 2, that it was something no one ever saw before (yeah right) actually IS something no one ever saw before, although no one connected to the film has said that. I guess when you deliver the goods, the way the filmmakers have done with Home Sick, you don't need to self promote. This may be Bill Mosely's best roll. He was absolutely perfect as the Razorblade man. And naked Tiffany.....

I was fortunate enough to catch this at a limited screening in my home town. I initially attended because it is my sincere belief that Tom Towles is one of America's most over-looked actors; consider, for example, his insightfully acted performance in Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986, McNaughton). I was fascinated that he was going to be gracing a local film.

To be honest, I was expecting very little from Home Sick. There seem to be a dozen indie horror filmmakers for every street. Most are sloppy gorefests that are, at best, terrible pseudo-hybrid remakes with descriptions like The Blair Witch Project meets The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. However, it became increasingly apparent as the film rolled that Wingard's Home Sick owed more to Renoir than Riami.

The rainy shots that play under the opening credits, for example, seemed to be a direct homage to Renoir's unfortunately obscure Nana (1926). I, of course, attributed this to an over-ambitious hope that someone else (a filmmaker from Alabama, no less!) has seen this forgotten masterpiece. After the screening, though, my suspicions were confirmed; the delightfully kind Adam Wingard did acknowledge his debt to Renoir (as well as Resnais, Bergman, Schlondorff and, perhaps most surprisingly - Russian fantasy-film icon Aleksandr Rou!) However, he assured me, as I was also able to assess myself throughout the screening, that he was aiming for more than Altmanesque nods to the art-house classics that he adored.

What refrains Wingard from merely imitating the grand successes of the important filmmakers that came before him is that his dystopian outlook is injected into a clever and non-judgmental deconstruction of the gorefest horror subgenre. Wingard has a perceptive understanding of this subgenre that I know I haven't seen since Zulawksi and his masterwork, Possession (1981). Many would here point to Miike as a more apt and comparable filmmaker, but it seems evident, at least to me, that Miike is a poor man's Kiyoshi Kurosawa with all of the aggravating flaws of Rainer Werner Fassbinder and none of the master filmmaker's attributes.

Home Sick suffers a terribly low rating here at IMDb and I am not surprised as many seem to be coming from irate Bill Moseley fans expecting another Essence of Echoes (2002, Rikert). Wingard surpasses Rikert and his embarrassing attempts at cinematic innovations by embracing that film does in fact have a history without resorting to simply visually quoting the best decisions of great filmmakers, such as Tarkovsky, Clement or Deren.

Home Sick is an original masterpiece and undoubtedly the most important horror film since Dreyer's Vampyr or Bergman's Hour of the Wolf.

This is a great movie for all gore fans. It has wackiness, Horror ,a bit a of dementia and plenty of gore and blood.

The premise is pretty crazy; as a room full of friends get together for a reunion of sorts. They are soon visited by Mr. Suitcase; who is wonderfully portrayed by Horror icon Bill Mosely. If you are familiar with his Otis character, then you know what to expect. He shows up with a suitcase full of razors,asks the kids to name specific people they hate and then performs a manic self inflicting blood letting act on himself. This somehow has conjured up some Demon like beast right out of Tobe Hoopers Fun House to kill off the said mention hated people. One of the friends actually just names "Everyone in the room" out of spite, not knowing what he has caused. Bill Mosley's scene reminded me of the crazy hitch hiker in 1976's Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

The only other two actors I recognized are Tom Towels as the twisted Red neck uncle and Tiffany Shepis as the vixen. She bares her boobs and soul as she actually does a great performance upon finding her dead mother.She really has developed into a horror scream queen herself and I really wish Rob Zombie would get her to act in his next film.

The rest of the actors are their for support mainly and they act bad on purpose. It's so over the top, that you know the director calls for it. These kids are really messed up. Dark circles around the eyes, maniacal laughter and are gore hounds themselves....and they die in the goriest and nastiest fashions imagined. I also found it funny to see that the one level headed character; Mark, played by Forrest Pitts; actually has a sort of Brad Pitt look and Accent.

Did I mention the gore? Buckets & Buckets and yet still looked Tom Savini worthy. there are also bone crunches, decapitations, and head bashing. In fact the head kills seems to be the demon's first choice when hacking and slashing.

All in All this flick is a great entry into Horror/Gore cinema. I recommend for all fans of the genre.

I have been waiting to see this movie and when i finally saw it I was not disappointed! The effects were awesome. It was gory as heck. Bill Moseley was awesome in it as well as Tom Towels (Both of Rob Zombie Fame). All the characters that were high looked like garbage and acted way out of the ordinary. I think the director and writer were trying to portray a message with that. But the acting was was good and there was some weird humor in it. To me, when a movie has you thinking about it long after it ends it is a good movie and this one had me thinking about it long after I watched it. I hope to see what else E.L. Katz (Writer/Producer) comes up with in the future. I hope it is as crazy, whacked-out and gory as "Home Sick" was. If your a horror fan than you should not miss this!