Follow the Bloodline: Hell House LLC: Lineage (2025)

Director: Stephen Cognetti

Notable Cast: Elizabeth Vermilyea, Sierra Sawka, Mike Sutton, Joe Bandelli, Cayla Berejikian, Victoria Andrunik, Gideon Berger, Bridget Rose Perrotta, Destiny Leilani Brown

 

For a series that found its success for being an incredibly effective blend of documentary and found footage horror, it’s certainly baffling to some degree that director Stephen Cognetti would abandon the style for the “final” entry into the Hell House LLC series. He had already dabbled in narrative/traditional filmmaking with his first film outside of Hell House, the already-forgotten 825 Forest Road, so to come back to Hell House and NOT continue with the style that he found success in really does make one scratch their noggin. 

 

The fifth - and again supposedly final - entry, Hell House LLC: Lineage, has its audience return to the layers of lore established by the previous four entries as Vanessa (from Hell House LLC III) and Alicia (Hell House LLC Origins) tentatively team up to put together the entire story and find out what the hell is killing people in Abaddon and try and put an end to it. 

 

Truthfully, after four films of lingering lore and the various histories around the town and haunted houses at the center of this franchise, this final entry is kinda needed to tie things up and get it all aligned. There’s always been a lot to digest in the sequels, particularly since each one seemingly tells more random details of a larger story, so there’s at least an intentionality here that’s respectful. Let’s finish it off, 

 

However, in attempting to do so, Lineage commits a dozen missteps that betray the series and what is necessary to make this film cook. The move to narrative filmmaking betrays what made the original films so good. Cognetti isn’t necessarily as well-versed in this approach (even though I was one of the few who felt 825 Forest Road was far better than expected), and it's apparent that the found-footage style was so ingrained in the storytelling of the previous entries that it's sorely missed here. The film just lacks an angle, and it falls flat because of it - both visually and in how its narrative unravels. It doesn’t help that the film has essentially no score, and the edits don't help Cognetti’s long takes, which tend to undercut any tension.

 

Also, this entry feels neither propulsive nor compelling. Cognetti is attempting something perhaps even more contemplative here, particularly as it touches on some interesting ideas around generational trauma, presented as a type of curse tied to the Lineage of some of the deaths, but Vanessa’s character is so passive - as is its narrative - that it feels like the film is dragging its characters - and thus its audience - forward towards its climax. By the time the Alicia character pops up, it’s almost too late, and her more interactive and driven character feels like an afterthought to get the story back to the haunted ass Carmichael Manner. Particularly when her big plan is basically to bless the house with a priest. Yawn.  

 

Which, by the time the film returns to the Carmichel Manner, the real scares and tension (the slow burn and subtle scares are certainly Cognetti’s strength) finally start to work. However, for a film that clocks in damn near two hours, that’s a long time before the film actually finds its voice again. The scares prior to that, explained as visions by a therapist who is far too open about telling Vanessa about her other patients’ issues and trauma, don’t work nearly as well and feel like they are simply spaced out to provide a few scares before the ending. Even then, compared to some of the previous films, Lineage feels almost too mundane to get those to pop. 

 

It’s unfortunate that, even if this is the last one - which I doubt, considering the cliffhanger at the end that answers nothing and just kind of ends the movie - the series ends on a low note. It’s the weakest script; the performances mostly ring hollow; the tension is undercut by significant pacing problems; and the scares don’t feel nearly as visceral or effective.  It has moments - fleeting ones or thematic tidbits that indicate what Hell House LLC: Lineage could have been, but the final product is one that is certainly a wild misfire. 

 

Written By Matt Malpica Reifschneider