Monster Inside: America’s Most Extreme Haunted House is a Hulu documentary about the phenomenon of extreme haunts – haunted-house attractions designed to make participants feel as if they’re inside a real-life horror show – and one man who takes the concept too far.
The Gist: With the continued popularity of spooky-season haunted houses and big-budget attractions like Universal’s Haunted Horror Nights, there’s a natural appetite for more extreme experiences that go beyond the realm of movie-world boogeyman popping out from shadowy corners for a good jump-scare. The audience for these “extreme haunts” can be horror fans looking for a stronger fix or people with PTSD seeking a safely administered hit of adrenaline; whatever their motivations, Russ McKamey has become a self-styled impresario of this niche. His McKamey Manor has boasted a thousands-long waiting list, a 40-page waiver that still may not be legal, a $20,000 prize for anyone able to complete its marathon-length physical and psychological tortures, and potential viral internet fame even if you don’t. Monster Inside: America’s Most Extreme Haunted House speaks extensively to several McKamey Manor participants who talk about the genuine danger this cultish project poses.
What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Though it’s a documentary, Monster Inside clearly wants to evoke classic horror films as a way of getting its viewers on the wavelength of people who might like to see how they fare inside of one (there are extremely brief clips from Texas Chain Saw Massacre, It, and others). The handheld camera work, shooting grainy footage of people in maximum discomfort, brings to mind both found-footage horror and Saw-style torture pictures. But you soon learn that McKamey is more of an internet-enabled cult leader (with the sadly predictable army of online defenders) than a classic horror villain, and the documentary has true-crime overtones. (You may have seen either Dark Tourist on Netflix or Haunters: The Art Of The Scare at some point over the years, both of which tackle the McKamey Manor controversy in their own ways.)
Performance Worth Watching: Those who speak out against McKamey on camera are obviously the most empathetic figures on screen, but it’s McKamey himself, often shown in selfie close-ups via his own footage, looking like a malevolent version of character actor Noah Emmerich, who’s the memorable figure here, in large part because his specific motivations and psychology remain a mystery (even as his power-trip intentions become clearer).
Memorable Dialogue: “One of the things I did was I started giving away body parts. I gave my kidney away. I was signed up to give a piece of my liver away. I also signed up for the bone-marrow transplant list. I was going to give away as much as I could,” says Brandon, an Iraq War vet discussing the PTSD and survivor’s guilt that led him to seek out extreme haunts.
Sex and Skin: It’s implied that the desire to participate in these experiences has a potential component of kink to it; late-movie footage from a more ethical “extreme haunt” (one that actually pays attention to safe words and the like) includes a masked topless woman.
Our Take: The story of Monster Inside is compelling, but also elusive. It sets up McKamey Manor as both an escalation of immersive horror experiences and an ultra-extreme version of a homemade (and unregulated) backyard haunted house – a bizarre but potent mix that goes a long way toward explaining why it attracts so much attention despite a litany of safety issues. But while the documentary’s participants express themselves clearly when explaining why they signed up for the McKamey challenge and how they wound up feeling genuinely scarred by it, the documentary itself doesn’t always provide similar clarity on the details. Despite a seeming wealth of footage (McKamey himself seems to shoot every individual multi-hour “tour”), the film remains fuzzy on plenty of naturally occurring questions: What was the process of gaining entry to McKamey Manor like, physically and practically? Why does so much of the “tour” footage seem to take place in a yard or a cellar, rather than the elaborate haunted house McKamey is later seen dismantling? Where does all this footage end up? McKamey doesn’t charge his participants money, but does he monetize the online videos in some way? Do participants ever complain that the haunt veers so far away from horror, given that much of it plays more like extreme survival challenges?
Even simpler matters like timeline – when did McKamey’s Manor start in its original location, how long did it last before being forced to move, and so on – are left vague, suggesting that the filmmakers either couldn’t find a way to weave more information into the narrative, or were more interested in first-person accounts than in background research. When the movie shows a more ethical version of an extreme haunt towards its end, presumably to illustrate that these kinds of experiences can be pursued without the power games and carelessness exhibited by McKamey, it doesn’t even bother to explain what this safer iteration of horror role-play actually is or where it can be found. (It almost seems staged, but the movie insists upfront that it contains no re-enactments.) The intent may have been to let the voices of McKamey’s victims drive the story, and indeed, the movie is most interesting when they explain the psychological torture they were subjected to. But with so much left unclear, the filmmakers also place an undue burden on their subjects, and leave their viewers fascinated while also wandering in the dark.
Our Call: For anyone still considering a trip to McKamey Manor – which, amazingly, still seems to be in some form of operation today – this is a must-see, as a warning and also a reassurance that these kinds of extreme thrills can be provided elsewhere, by people who are probably not sociopaths. But viewers looking for a clearly laid-out and thought-provoking documentary might still SKIP IT.
Jesse Hassenger (@rockmarooned) is a writer living in Brooklyn. He’s a regular contributor to The A.V. Club, Polygon, and The Week, among others. He podcasts at www.sportsalcohol.com, too.