Netflix instant find:"The Devil Times Five"

Holidays at my job are positively glacial, both in temperature and pace. So much so, that I think even the Puritans wouldn't begrudge me an online movie break now and again. Whether or not they would've condoned my watching "The Devil Times Five" (a.k.a. "People Toys" a.k.a.
"The Horrible House on the Hill"); another matter entirely.

Made in 1974 this one is as nasty as it is goofy, and that is no middling feat. The tale is fairly simple. A rag-tag group of killer kids escape from an unknown institution and make their way to a secluded Lake Arrowhead Chalet. Once there, they commence offing the all too trusting vacationers and their developmentally delayed caretaker.
There is some frighteningly bad editing here and more than a few slow passages. But the strangeness of the kids and the brutality of the dispatches make the 88 minutes worth the slog.

Highlights:
-70's teen idol Leif Garret (all of 10 here) as a cross dressing boy genius
-The other strange striplings, including a diminutive drill sergeant, a nutter nubile nun, and a seriously borderline little girl with abandonment issues
- MILF-fantastico Carolyn Stellar eaten alive by Piranha...in her alpine bathtub
-A snowman named Papa Doc
-Fun with Bear Traps
-The seduction of the freakishly strong developmentally disabled house keeper
-The end credits that start,confusingly, with the words 'The Beginning'

This was a nice find in the old instant viewing section of Netflix. If you have 88 minutes that you feel like spending on senseless savagery perpetrated by kids without conscience...you really can't do any better than this film. The experience is only ameliorated if one can manage to get paid in the process.