Decorating for a cause

North Texas house goes all pink this Halloween for breast cancer awareness

Angela Fincher's "Pink'd Out House" in North Richland Hills.

Angela Fincher says she’s not entirely sure why she decided to decorate her house pink, but she knows she had to do something to raise awareness for breast cancer survivors.

The 47-year-old mother of three was diagnosed with breast cancer in February 2021 and fought it until September of that year. This October — Halloween month and Breast Cancer Awareness Month — she has decorated her home in North Richland Hills with pink Christmas lights and a pink pumpkin patch in her yard to raise awareness of breast cancer.

The home even has its own public Facebook page, called Pink'd Out House.

“This year for some reason — I wish I could give you this grand reason why, but I don’t know why — I just thought it would be kind of cool to do something for breast cancer awareness, being a survivor myself,” Fincher says. “I thought it would be cool to make my house pink and let people come see this pink’d out house.”

The UNT alumna started tossing around the idea for a “Pink’d Out House” in August and mentioned it to a girlfriend, who eagerly encouraged her. On August 25, the day of her biannual mammogram, she started working on a plan, creating the display’s name and Facebook page and mapping out the decor.

Creating the display was a community effort.Facebook/Pink'd Out House

At first, Fincher wasn’t sure how to elevate the display beyond just hanging pink Christmas lights, but eventually she decided to add a patch of pumpkins painted pink to her front yard. She says she didn’t think people would go see a house that just had pink Christmas lights and wanted to give visitors something more.

“If I can give you a pumpkin patch, and a pink pumpkin patch at that, then anyone can show up,” Fincher says. “You don’t even have to know anybody or be affected by breast cancer, but you’re at least knowing what the meaning is and showing up.”

Creating the display was a community effort. Fincher says she had eight friends help install the lights and paint pumpkins over several days. She also placed magnetic breast cancer awareness ribbons on her garage door that visitors can write prayers, poems, survivors’ names, or other notes on. There also are stones people can paint or leave messages on.

The public can write survivors' names or other messages on the display.Facebook/Pink'd Out House

Fincher wasn’t seeking to gain anything by decorating her house for breast cancer awareness — she just wanted to do it. She says she has three girlfriends currently fighting breast cancer, and their battles are much worse than hers was. While Fincher only had a lobectomy, her friends are having to undergo double mastectomies and losing all their hair, she says. Seeing her close friends still fighting instilled a compassion in her that inspired her to do something.

Her only hope with the display is to raise awareness of breast cancer, encourage women to get mammograms, and provide hope and support to those affected by breast cancer.

Within the first couple days after launching the Pink’d Out House, Fincher received encouraging support. North Richland Hills mayor Oscar Trevino, the city’s fire department chief Stan Tinney, and some police officers visited Fincher and her house.

Angela with the NRH mayor and members of the police and fire departments.Facebook/Pink'd Out House

Fincher says she has been an “emotional wreck” throughout the process.

“It has been a very rough journey to get to this,” she says. “I would go to sleep at night and I would have voices telling me ‘this is stupid, no one’s gonna come’ and ‘no one’s gonna come to your stupid house to see your stupid thing that you’re doing.’ And it was rough.”

Fincher says she would toss and turn at night, full of negativity. She had to convince herself that her idea was worth the effort, but the community’s response has shown her she was right.

The exhibit is free to visit, but Fincher has plans to eventually create a Venmo account for those who want to make donations. She plans to donate a portion of contributions to a local charity, which she has not selected yet, and use a portion to expand her display in the future.

Fincher’s home will stay decorated until October 31, and she plans to continue pink’ing it out annually in October. Those interested can visit the Pink’d Out House on Buck Street in North Richland Hills and follow the house on Facebook and Instagram.

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Movie Review

Faces of Death returns with modern twist on cult horror film

Photo courtesy of of IFC Films

Dacre Montgomery in Faces of Death.

True horror fans will likely be familiar with the 1978 cult film Faces of Death, which purported to be a documentary showing real-life killings in gory detail. It didn’t, of course, but that didn’t stop rumors from continuing to spread for decades. Now, almost 50 years and multiple sequels later, comes a new version of Faces of Death, an actual movie that pays homage to the original in interesting ways.

Margot (Barbie Ferreira) works at a YouTube-like company called Kino as a content moderator, flagging videos that violate the company’s policies. This means her job often involves seeing some truly despicable things from all manner of depraved people. One day, though, she comes across a video that seems a little too real, and after seeing more similar videos, she starts to believe they’re genuine murders.

Going against her company NDA, she starts to investigate the videos on her own, which puts her on the radar of Arthur (Dacre Montgomery), who is actually kidnapping people and killing them on camera through methods seen in the original Faces of Death film. It’s not long before Arthur tracks her down, with a plan to make her one of his next victims.

Written and directed by Daniel Goldhaber (How to Blow Up a Pipeline) and co-written by Isa Mazzei, the film is not so much scary as it is creepy, with the occasional gross-out sequence. The idea of having someone emulate the killings in the cult film is a good idea, and pairing it with the modern-day attention economy - in which content creators go to increasing lengths for clicks - is a clever twist on a concept that other films have done.

The film as a whole is a commentary on how social media and video sharing sites have often decided to prioritize profits over the well-being of their users. Margot is shown allowing videos involving violence and sexual assault to stay on the site while nixing ones depicting how to use Narcan or demonstrating putting on a condom on a banana. Josh (Jermaine Fowler), Margot’s boss, is even explicit in the company mandate that outrageous videos drive views.

While Arthur has the makings of a good villain, there are few attempts to make him seem truly diabolical. His kidnappings often seem more spur-of-the-moment than calculated, and even though he has a well thought-out dungeon at home, the house’s location in the suburbs seems to make him vulnerable to easy discovery. Goldhaber and Mazzei leave more than a few unanswered questions along the way that take away from the intensity of the story.

Ferreira is yet another actor from Euphoria who’s capitalizing on her exposure from that show. She plays Margot’s increasing anxiety well, and when the action ratchets up in the final act, she meets the moment in a satisfying way. Montgomery returns to the vibe he had while playing the evil Billy on Stranger Things, and even though his character doesn’t fully live up to his potential, Montgomery sells his evil for all it’s worth.

The new Faces of Death may not be what some are expecting given the reputation of the previous films, but it’s a solid horror/thriller that uses the brand as a launching pad into something different. It doesn’t make much of a dent in the scare department, but it does give its violence and gore a degree of relevance in today’s often desensitized world.

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Faces of Death is now playing in theaters.

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