As soon as the lights went down in the theater there was this strange, prevailing scraping sound. At first I thought there must be something wrong with the sound system. But as soon as the movie began, I knew what it was. It was the sound made by scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Which is obviously where they got "House of the Dead," another flimsy excuse for a horror movie recently released by Brightlight Films which was co-produced and based on a popular Sega video game. Of course, unlike other video-game based flicks like "Resident Evil", "House of the Dead" doesn't try very hard to disguise the fact that it's based on one. In many of the scenes during which the movie's brain dead cast are running around shooting mass quantities of equally brain dead and badly made up zombies, scenes from the game are actually inserted into the action. Likewise, there are lots and lots of those stop action shots where the camera rotates around the frozen form and plenty of slow motion shots of bullets disrupting the air as they zoom toward their targets. But while both were awesome and innovative special effects when they were first used in "The Matrix" back in 1999, now they're just annoying.

Then again, there isn't much about "House of the Dead" that isn't annoying, beginning with the paper-thin plot. Supposedly, the rave party of the century is being held on a small deserted island off the coast of Seattle, only five disgustingly rich young yuppies (Among them are Ona Grauer as Alicia and Johnaton Cherry as her former boyfriend Rudy, who broke up with her so he could study medicine and she could fence) have missed the party boat and have to hire a grizzled skipper named Captain Kirk (Jurgen Prochnow) and his demented Gillian-type toad of a first mate (Clint Howard) to give them a lift. It just so happens that Kirk is a gun smuggler (isn't that convenient?) being chased by a coast guard agent named Casper (Ellie Cornell) who secretly follows him to the island. When they get there it's only to find that everyone is gone (although the banners stating that the party has been sponsored by Sega aren't), so there's some gratuitous sex and drinking before the woods are suddenly filled with zombies. From there on it's an endless series of chases, blazing gunfire, kung fu fighting, explosions and even a swordfight as everyone tries to find a way off the island.

Actually, the entire film is pretty much like the game itself. The zombies in the woods are pretty easy to beat. The zombies in the water that have taken over Captain Kirk's boat are harder. The zombies in the house on the middle of the island are harder still, and the fight with the main zombie is the most difficult of all. It's just a crying shame that the theater didn't install joysticks on the backs of all the seats.

The sad fact about "House of the Dead" is that it offers viewers absolutely nothing new. There are no surprises, and everything from the special effects to the bad make up has been seen before. And since it's more like an hour-and-a-half long infomercial for Sega than an actual horror movie, it isn't surprising that there isn't a single scare. Sure, there are buckets of blood and lots and lots of exploding heads. But that's not the same thing at all.

While most of the performances in this film are as dead as the house itself, Ona Grauer at least takes a stab at being serious about what's going on, although Johnathon Cherry as her boyfriend Rudy (and the sole survivor narrator of the film) doesn't do much more than hulk around trying to look like a younger version of Bruce Campbell. Jurgen Prochnow as Captain Kirk is so wasted in the role that's it's painful to watch, and Elle Cornell as his nemesis, Casper the friendly coast guard agent (who was actually pretty good in former films like "Halloween 4 and 5") delivers her lines as if someone was holding a gun to her head. I mean, you really can't say much about a film in which Clint Howard as the demented first mate turned in the best performance. Although actress Erica Parker does do a pretty good gratuitous nude scene before the zombies eat her at the beginning of the movie.

This entire mess was both produced and directed by Uwe Boll from a waste of time script by Mark Altman and David Parker.

Based on the moves and techniques displayed in "House of the Dead," Boll might want to think about changing his first name to Terra, since it would, after all, be much more descriptive of his work.