The movie wastes no time getting started, with TV's Susan fucking Lucci displaying supernatural powers in the very first scene. It's an effective (if unintentionally comedic) first scene, but it kind of undermines some of the suspense of the movie. More on that later.
TV's Robert Urich stars as the patriarch of a family (including TV's Soleil Moon Frye) who is moving to a new town for a big time, big paycheck job. Some technology he's been working on is going to be integrated into a space suit intended for upcoming missions to Venus.
Everyone at work seems to be a part of the local country club, which is run by Susan Lucci, including TV's Joe Regalbuto who can't shut up about how Urich's family should join. Join the club! Join the club! Broken record, amirite? Urich's too much of a rugged individualist for all that but the wife and kids want in.
So, it's clear something sinister's going on at the country club. Urich's family starts to act weird. The family dog starts barking at them, and then disappears (dogs are becoming a thing with Craven). We get a glimpse at the "joining the club" ritual and it's clearly not on the up and up. Plus, we already know Lucci is magic. BLACK MAGIC!
INVITATION TO HELL is similar to STRANGER IN OUR HOUSE in that both stories involve one character suspecting something bad's going on, and no one else believing them. Even Kevin McCarthy from INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS is on hand to make sure the proceedings get as paranoid as possible. The difference is, STRANGER IN OUR HOUSE buries the lead and makes you wait for the awesome payoff, and INVITATION TO HELL tips its hand to the viewer too soon. We know what's going on way before Urich does and the movie loses some suspense because of it.
The movie bounces back a little in the end when Urich gets the idea to use his space suit to fight the bad guys (even though the audience has long since figured the space suit was going to be the key to victory here).
This movie also kind of reminded me of the flick from HORRORFEST 2014 called SOCIETY in which a Beverly Hills teen discovers his upper class friends and family are all part of an inhuman species who literally feeds on poor people. INVITATION TO HELL isn't as good as SOCIETY, and doesn't get as weird or gross as SOCIETY, but they'd make a pretty good double feature.
Oh yeah, don't miss creepy John Berryman in a cameo.
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