Can someone help me identify an odd movie with black goo coming down the chimney?

September 14, 2006 7:26 PM

When I was about ten when I saw this movie about a family trapped in a house. Their windows and doors were bricked in and they could not get out. Whenever they turned the television on a strange logo appeared. I think I remember the mother accusing the father of having done something to cause this situation. The thing that sticks in my mind was a scene towards the end of the movie where tons of black goo comes down the chimney and out of the fireplace.

I had largely given up figuring out just what I saw as I have described it to others on numerous occasions, I even asked stumptheshark, and no one has ever known what I am talking about.

Then last night a friend asked me (based on the poor assumption that because I am 'old' I am an 80s oracle of some sort) about a 'strange movie' she saw as a kid. My friend said there were dolls involved. Then when she described the black goo coming down the chimney we both realised we had finally met soemone else who had seen the same movie and it was a truly emotional bonding experience.

Ahem.

So, can anyone help me identify this from the scant details I have given? Any clues would be much appreciated.

posted by Sonny Jim to Media & Arts (14 answers total)

sounds like twilight zone.
posted by MonkeySaltedNuts at 7:29 PM on September 14, 2006

There's a lot of black goo in Amityville Horror, but the rest doesn't sound right. (some pictures of the goo here.) (Yeah, you heard me. I'm linking to pictures of goo.)
posted by jessenoonan at 8:05 PM on September 14, 2006

Did it have anything to do with Halloween? As in the family was part of a test experiment, put on some masks made by some company, watched this commercial on TV and then all died?
posted by cbushko at 8:06 PM on September 14, 2006

Halloween 3: Season of the Witch was the movie I was thinking about.

Halloween 3: Season of the Witch

p.s. I still remember the song from this movie. I bet I was 8 years old at the time when I saw it.
posted by cbushko at 8:17 PM on September 14, 2006

It was an episode titled "Child's Play" from a British TV show called "Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense." The surprise ending reveals that the family members are actually dolls in a futuristic child's doll house.
posted by RichardP at 8:25 PM on September 14, 2006

By the way, the Hammer House of Mystery & Suspense: Child's Play episode summary from tv.com includes all the detail you recall.
posted by RichardP at 8:42 PM on September 14, 2006

That's it! Thanks so much, RichardP.

(And everyone else who responded.)
posted by Sonny Jim at 8:42 PM on September 14, 2006

i saw this movie as a kid too. very memorable. I was incredibly disappointed by the revelation at the end, even at 6 years old though.

But, hang on, they are not dolls ! that's cheating...
posted by dydecker at 1:10 AM on September 15, 2006

dydecker:

Mostly it was the goo coming down the chimney and the sinister logo that left a lasting impact on me.

I have to admit I don't remember the conclusion at all. It can't have impressed me much either.
posted by Sonny Jim at 1:49 AM on September 15, 2006

The goo was white or pink or something because it was ice cream. Yeah, you're the first person who knows this movie too - I bet you we saw it at the same time in NZ, too.
posted by dydecker at 2:13 AM on September 15, 2006

I mean at the end of the movie you found out that the kid had spilled ice cream on the doll's house.
posted by dydecker at 2:16 AM on September 15, 2006

I remember this too, and I'm in the States - we saw it here on a series called "Saturday Nightmares".
posted by catesbie at 6:59 AM on September 15, 2006

I remember movie! Watched it with my parents on USA.
posted by armacy at 8:09 AM on September 15, 2006

The symbol which started appearing on everything (including the family members themselves right at the end) was the logo of the toy manufacturer that made them.

I also think that the girl at the end had put the whole doll house in an oven (because kids do that sort of thing), the walls of which were the 'bricking in' of the windows and doors.

And then it was time for the goodnight kiwi.

Ah, 80's.
posted by Kiwi at 8:29 AM on September 15, 2006