The Murder House

Blob of mercury? Wow! That's jogged my memory of being handed the mortar and pestle to mix the mercury amalgam myself! A shocker when you think about it!

It's brilliant how 'The Murder House' ends with 'the boy' returning to class 'a man' and he's not at all frightened by the sight of inoculating jabs - a jab which ironically, contained additional Mercury!

I can now, 40 years later, confess that in the early 70's one bored weekend, some older boys and I broke into the dental clinic of a local primary school and stole an entire test tube of Mercury. We took it home, played with it, divided it into four, and I, as an unstoppable curious kid, continued to play with it for about 18 months! I mixed it with vinegar and bi-carb, salt, sugar - the whole kitchen cupboard... then shook and sniffed the mixture!



Certain industrialised countries, while still offering free-of-charge mercury-amalgam fillings to patients, have ceased manufacture of the toxic stuff in their own countries 'cause they know it invariably ends up in the drain! If the stupid, toxic stuff wasn't there in that dental clinic the first place, none of that risk could possibly have occurred! There's no serve-you-right about it as retribution for burgling and vandalising the clinic - it should not have been there in the first place!

My dentist friend knows dang-well the dangers of what she's obliged to put into her patients teeth and she does intravenous chelation therapy every six months!

The only thing they missed out were the cotton thingies being made into buzzy bees or fairies for us, and the most fun part was a blob of mercury to play with and take home... if you could hold it in your hand long enough (true story)

this is was the old primary school i went to i was in the film

Funny but this brings back bad memories for me. When I was at Breens Intermediate School in Christchurch (in the 70's) the bloody sadist dentist (female) pulled out my left upper molar without a needle and the thing wasn't even loose. Cow!

NZ school dental clinics were exactly like this except mine had more than a dozen chairs - I cannot remember exactly how many (Mt Roskill Primary, Intermediate and Grammar School dental clinic).

The dental nurses did not lock the door, nor were they sarcastic like the one in the movie clip, but EVERYTHING the boy in this short movie felt, we all as kids went through (including the bars on the bathroom windows as well as the matron standing guard at the entry door until every child was seated with the bib on; also including the incident with the hot boiled dental instruments being touched on your neck to test them to see if they were too hot to use.

This movie clip was sooooo accurate!

I met a lady in the mid to late 1990's who was in charge of the Auckland region dental clinics (Carrol ...; those who were in the know will know of her) and I asked her the question. "Did they just drill our teeth for practice?"
She said for the most they did, but, that practice stopped in the late 1980's - too late for me.

the classroom and playground sequences were authentic so its a pity the film takes such a cheap shot at a unique approach to children oral health. If parents took more care of their children's diet, dental anxiety and the murder house concept would vanish. This is an insult to dental nurses.

WOW from a retired SDN. I loved my patients and made every effort to make them happy. This is a spoof on our daily work.

WE CARED.

This was my experience exactly! Well captured!

I used this with my year 3 and 4 students when we were talking about feeling scared and how movie makers use music and sound effects to enhance the mood of the movie. This was a perfect example to use with children at this level. As a survivor of the "Murder House Days", I have to say your movie was spot on, and brought vivid memories to the fore.
Congratulations, team. This movie is a winner.