THE HAUNTING (1963)

 

(Director: Robert Wise. Screenwriter: Nelson GIdding. Based on Shirley Jackson’s 1959 gothic horror novel The Haunting of Hill House.)

 

Review

In the supposedly haunted, ninety-year-old Hill House in Massachusetts, Dr. John Markway (Richard Johnson, ZOMBIE, 1979) brings together a group of paranormal researchers to investigate the long-empty abode. In allowing him access, one of the conditions Mrs. Sanderson (Fay Compton), Hill House’s owner, places on Markway is that he must allow her nephew (Luke Sanderson, played by Russ Tamblyn, TWIN PEAKS, 2017) to be present during the investigation. It’s said that no one has stayed in the house for more than two or three days, not since its last owner—who may’ve murdered its previous owner— hanged herself by its spiral staircase inside the library.

Out of the nine investigators Markway invites, two accept. The first is self-assured, darkly funny Theodora, a.k.a. “Theo” (Claire Bloom), a psychic. The second is frangible, psychically sensitive Eleanor “Nell” Lance (Julie Harris, also said to be fragile during HAUNTING’s filming), who’s trying to escape her nasty family. Eleanor, the first to arrive and whose thoughts are voiced for the audience, is immediately drawn to the house in an unhealthy way. Theodora arrives shortly afterward, honestly telling Eleanor that Hill House “wants” her—not that Eleanor minds. She views this macabre outing as a “vacation” and “want[s] to stay, period.”

Dr. Johnson, showing up a few minutes later, informs the two women that “all the doors are hung slightly off-set, which explains why they keep shutting by themselves. . . all the angles are slightly off, not a square corner in the place."

During their initial tour of the claustrophobic, Rococo-style spook house, they meet Luke Sanderson, who doesn’t believe Hill House is inhabited by ghosts. The young man cites “subterranean water”, “atmospheric pressure”, “sunspots” and “electric currents” as the reasons its “disturbances”. The film’s tone is light, humorous, the house well-lit with no shadowy corners.

Later that night, Eleanor—around whom much of the paranormal activity centers—wakes to loud and violent pounding on the walls and her bedroom door, noises that terrify Theo as well. It’s during these scenes that darkness reappears (early scenes relating to the house’s history were shadow-drenched), a tonal, menacing shift furthered by HAUNTING’s sound department, with odd noises and the faint sound of a woman’s mocking laughter.

From there, the situation worsens with more overt manifestations (human or supernatural?), becoming more intense and dreadful. Will any of them leave the house whole, healthy?

HAUNTING, an excellent psychological (and G-rated!) film, with lots of odd tracking shots and pans, constantly roving cameras, and low angle shot, something director Robert Wise and cinematographer Davis Boulton (MODESTY BLAISE, 1966) worked out. These shots and other visual tricks heighten the effect of HAUNTING’s physical aspects (credit interior designer Elliot Scott and set decorator John Jarvis). Humphrey Searle’s well-timed, often nuanced score, along with its actors, complete the overall effect of the film.

 

All of HAUNTING’s players are excellent, from Harris’s volatile Eleanor to Lois Maxell’s ghost-doubting Grave Markway, Dr. Markway’s wife. (Many filmgoers know Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny in fourteen James Bond films, starting with DR. NO, 1962). All of these actors embody and/or lighten (when necessary) the emotional intensity of the expansive, sensory-oppressive manse, in one of the best entries in the spook house genre.

 

Deep(er) filmic dive

According to IMDb, director Robert Wise shot HAUNTING (a title suggested by source-book author Shirley Jackson) in black and white because it added to the “rich atmospheric quality” of the film.

Julie Harris said the film censors dictated that Theo must never touch Eleanor, to downplay Theo’s lesbian attraction to Eleanor. In spite of this, they touched or sat close to each other several times in the film.

Fans of the hard rock band White Zombie might recognize their sampling of a line of dialogue from HAUNTING in their song “Super-Charger Heaven” (off their 1995 ASTRO-CREEP: 2000 album), specifically Dr. Markway’s line “Now I know the supernatural is something that isn’t supposed to happen, but it does happen.”

Russ Tamblyn, in an uncredited role, played a psychiatrist in the streaming Netflix series THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE (2018).

Director/screenwriter Ti West is said to be a fan of HAUNTING. His first film, THE HOUSE OF THE DEVIL (2009) is a copycat-title nod to the title given to HAUNTING when originally released in France.

DON’T LISTEN (2020)

 

(a.k.a. VOCES; streaming/Netflix movie; director/co-story source: Àngel Gómez Hernández. Co-screenwriter: Santiago Díaz. Co-story source: Victor Gado.)

Review

LISTEN is an overlong and mostly by-the-numbers Spanish spook house-possession film. A couple (Daniel and Ruth), with their nine-year-old son Eric, move into a house to renovate and sell it. When Eric starts hearing voices and drawing disturbing pictures, his parents become concerned. They hire a child psychologist, kicking off a number of unnatural deaths. This prompts Daniel and Ruth to hire two paranormal specialists, an old man (Germán) and his daughter (Sara) who have their own tragic pasts they’re dealing with.

LISTEN is a decent flick if you’re not looking for anything original, with laid-on-thick drama, spooky camera shots, solid acting, bold-not-shocking-deaths, and one effective twist near the end that may floor those not paying attention to what’s going on. It also helps if you don’t mind a film with lots of lag scenes, story-effective pacing sacrificed for the sake of atmosphere. If you’re not sick of this movie by its finish, stick around to the end of its credits for the crappy-looking sequel it leaves an opening for.

LAKE OF THE DEAD (1958)

 

(a.k.a LAKE OF THE DAMNED; director/screenwriter: Kåre Bergstrøm)

Review

In August 1958, a group of longtime friends head to a lakeside cabin to visit another friend, Bjørn Werner, who’s disappeared. Bjørn’s sister (Liljan), in this group, fears something has happened to him. Others, whose professions range from psychoanalyst to lawyer, dismiss Liljan’s fears.

When they arrive at the lake and cabin, Bjørn and his dog (Spot) are nowhere to be seen. The cabin door seems to open as if of its own accord, but the friends shake it off. With them is a local constable (Bråten), who helps them investigate Bjørn’s disappearance. Bråten tells them about the legend of the lake, cabin and the cabin’s former occupants, a hundred years ago─Tore Gråvik, a man with a wooden left leg, lusted after his sister, and when she took up with another man, he killed them before drowning himself in the lake. Since then, the story goes that whoever stays in the cabin will become possessed by Gråvik’s malevolent spirit.

The friends debate what to do next, each of them representing and stating their professional outlooks and making accusations, even as further weirdness occurs, e.g., a recurring, distinctive footprint around the lake and several characters’ efforts, some sleepwalking, others hypnotized, to drown themselves in the lake.

Is someone puppet mastering the situation to hide something about Bjørn’s disappearance? Or is the lake (whose idyllic shots are paired with Gunnar Sønstevold’s melancholic, restrained soundtrack) and its surrounding area haunted by Gråvik and others?

This seventy-seven-minute, black and white Norwegian film, based on André Bjerke’s 1942 mystery-horror novel (he wrote it under the name Bernhard Borge), is a visually striking, excellent work, with sharp, moody cinematography (courtesy of Ragnar Sørenson) and equally sharp editing (Olav Engebretsen). Arne Holm’s well-timed sound effects further LAKE’s effectiveness. Its use of well-acted characters-as-avatars-for-debate-points helps elevate LAKE to greatness, placing it next to spook house films like Robert Wise’s THE HAUNTING (1963) and John Hough’s THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE (1973), as does Bergstrøm’s screenplay and direction.

LAKE’s players include source-novel author André Bjerke as magazine editor Gabriel Mørk.

LAKE is worth your time if you appreciate black and white films that ably mix atmospheric, lots-of-talking mystery punctuated with spooky events and elements, striking visuals, and offbeat endings. You might figure out what’s going on─it’s not difficult to do─but there are enough red herrings that, with a changed scene or two, it could’ve logically gone other ways as well. This is one of my all-time favorite spook house films. Director/screenwriter Nini Bull Robsahm’s remake was released in 2019.

AMITYVILLE 1992: IT’S ABOUT TIME (1992)

 

(a.k.a. AMITYVILLE: IT’S ABOUT TIME. Director: Tony Randel. Screenplay by Christopher DeFaria and Antonio Toro, based on John G. Jones’s 1988 advertised-as-fiction book, AMITYVILLE: THE EVIL ESCAPES.)

Storyline

An architect brings home an antique mantle clock he bought during his business travels, unaware that it’s an evil, time-and-space-warping machine.

Review

Burlwood, California. Jacob Sterling (Stephen Macht, GRAVEYARD SHIFT, 1990), an architect and intense person, returns to his suburban house from a business trip during which he picked up an antique clock. Unaware or dismissive of the history of the notorious house it came from, he’s excited to place on it on the mantle above their fireplace.

His teenage children, Lisa (Megan Ward, TRANCERS II, 1991) and Rusty (Damon Martin, GHOULIES II, 1987), are happy to see him, as is his ex-girlfriend and art student Andrea Livingston (Shawn Weatherly, SHADOWZONE, 1990), who watched the kids while Jacob was gone.

Jacob convinces Andrea─in spite of her new boyfriend─to spend the night with him. Rusty─spirited, good-hearted, and sensitive─senses something weird about the clock, but he’s not sure what it is. One of the neighbors’ dogs (Peaches) also knows something’s wrong, and barks outside the Sterlings’ backdoor late at night, running away when Rusty opens the door to let the dog in.

The next day, Peaches, normally a peaceable canine, attacks Jacob while he goes on his morning run. Jacob, seriously wounded, survives the attack. The wound extends Andrea’s stay with the Sterlings, delighting Jacob─he wants her back. Weird stuff happens, like brief time-and-space shifts for those living within the house, and Jacob’s go-getter personality becomes darker, verging on violent─he refuses to have his bandages changed, despite his festering wounds.

After a spate of mean-spirited neighborhood vandalism, dark personality changes, and bizarre deaths of those near the Sterlings, the situation comes to a head, and Jacob goes full-psycho, with his clock-dominated house as a reality-shifting accomplice.

The clever dovetail ending is relatively happy and good, a creative breath of fresh air in a genre that too often favors unnecessary darkness in its filmic wrap-ups. (Shock or the-evil-survived finishes need not bash viewers over the head with obviousness, and such endings should do more than further a franchise’s financial profitability or be used to hide the fact that the filmmakers are creatively spent, producer-pushed or lazy.)

TIME is a good, low-budget, and slick B-flick, its storyline a mix of WAXWORK (1988) and a metaphor for toxic relationships. TIME is better than the two previous AMITYVILLE outings (AMITYVILLE 3-D, 1983, and AMITYVILLE HORROR: THE EVIL ESCAPES, 1989), building on the loosely linked storyline of ESCAPES.

Randel’s direction and DeFaria and Toro’s screenplay keeps the relatively goreless TIME moving along at a mostly solid, entertaining pace (even if I did wonder why Andrea stuck around the Sterlings’ disturbing household), with an effective object backstory that adds depth to this film and (possibly) the AMITYVILLE franchise, with all its disparate works.

TIME’s cast, ranging from good to great, is effective as well, with Macht nailing Jacob’s increasingly menacing attitude, Weatherly capably embodying Andrea’s flaws, struggles and overall good nature as she tries to save the Sterlings, and Nina Talbot (PUPPET MASTER II, 1990) as Iris Wheeler, Rusty’s afterschool chess-playing partner and occult-savvy neighbor. Fans of screen legend Dick Miller (PIRANHA, 1978) might be delighted to see his brief turn here as Mr. Anderson, who helps put out a yard fire.

TIME, a mostly fun, low-budget time-space-horror flick, is worth your time if you keep your expectations realistic about its budget, its era (the slick-flick 1980s-1990s), and don’t mind a few eye-rolling tropes (e.g., Andrea and Jacob’s sex scene) during its run-time.

AMITYVILLE HORROR: THE EVIL ESCAPES (1989)

 

(a.k.a. AMITYVILLE 4: THE EVIL ESCAPES. TV/NBC movie, aired on May 12, 1989. Director: Sandor Stern. Teleplay by Sandor Stern, based on an unpublished AMITYVILLE story─not co-producer John G. Jones’s 1988 advertised-as-fiction book, Amityville: The Evil Escapes, whose title Jones allowed the filmmakers to use.)

Storyline

The demon-haunted house is cleansed by six priests and its furniture is sold at a yard sale. One of the items, a lamp within which the demon hid, is shipped to a California home, where the horror begins anew.

Review

This fourth, made-for-television AMITYVILLE entry aired on NBC on May 12,1989. When it was released on video, additional footage was shot, most of it brief instances of bright red blood that wouldn’t have been allowed in the NBC broadcast─director and teleplay writer Sandor Stern has said he doesn’t know who shot the additional footage. An R rating was slapped on the video version though it’s a safe-for-television flick.

EVIL takes place before the events of AMITYVILLE 3-D (1983), opening with six priests going into the Amityville house to cleanse it. One of the priests, Father Kibbler, is attacked by the house’s three-hundred-year-old demon who has transmigrated into a standing, twisted tree-like lamp. Kibbler, unconscious, is brought to hospital while his fellow priests declare the house “clean.”

A few days later, Helen Royce (Peggy McCay) buys the lamp from a yard sale and sends it to her sister, Alice Leacock (Jane Wyatt) in California.

Alice’s widowed daughter, Nancy Evans (Patty Duke, THE SWARM, 1978) shows up at Alice’s house shortly after the lamp. Nancy arrives with three children in tow: adolescent Amanda (Zoe Trilling, NIGHT OF THE DEMONS 2, 1994); tween Brian (Aron Eisenberg, PUPPET MASTER III: TOULON’S REVENGE, 1991); and pre-tween Jessica (Brandy Gold), who talks to her dead, imagined father.

The lamp talks to Jessica, pretending to be her father. She falls under its dark sway and acts uncharacteristically moody. A doctor (Warren Munson, FRIDAY THE 13^th PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN, 1989) says she needs rest.

Strange things happen in the brightly lit house─there are few dark shots in EVIL. The lights flicker a lot. Bad things happen to people, including Gabe, a plumber (Gary Davies, SHOCKER, 1989), and Peggy, Alice’s maid (Lou Hancock, EVIL DEAD 2, 1987). When Father Kibbler shows up, Alice and their family realize what’s happening─now, if they can exorcise the lamp. . .

EVIL is not a scary flick. The mounting tension between the characters does not get nasty like the Lutzes’ and the Monticellis’. EVIL is also more entertaining (in a white-washed, silly way) than AMITYVILLE 3-D, especially when certain actors ham it up during their terror scenes. Near the end, there’s a farewell-to-a-priest scene that’s directly lifted from THE EXORCIST (1973).

Film geeks like myself might recognize Robert  Allan Browne (PSYCHO II, 1983), who plays Donald McTear, and one of the priests (John DeBello, billed as John Debello, who appears in the 1989 film NIGHT LIFE).

EVIL is a Golden Turkey made-for-television flick, worthwhile if you’re looking for something silly.

AMITYVILLE 3-D (1983)

 

(a.k.a. AMITYVILLE III: THE DEMON. Director: Richard Fleischer. Screenwriter: David Ambrose, billed as William Wales.)

Storyline

An investigative magazine reporter going through a divorce moves into the DeFeo murder house with his teenage daughter. Of course, paranormal stuff and deaths follow.

Review

AMITYVILLE 3-D, like THE AMITYVILLE HORROR (1979) and AMITYVILLE II: THE POSSESSION (1982), is only marginally connected to its namesake flicks. There’s no mention of the Lutzes (a legal stipulation, per a Lutz-instigated lawsuit) or the fictional Monticellis (of AMITYVILLE II), who were cinematic stand-ins for the real-life DeFeos. In AMITYVILLE 3-D, the events of the second film are said to have happened to the DeFeos.

AMITYVILLE 3-D begins with an investigative magazine reporter, John Baxter (Tony Roberts) and his photographer, Melanie (Candy Clark, CAT’S EYE, 1985) busting psychic frauds, Harold and Emma Caswell, who hold seances in the notorious spook house. Helping John and Melanie in their sting operation is Elliot West (Robert Joy, THE HILLS HAVE EYES, 2006), a scientist and paranormal debunker.

John─divorcing his wife, Nancy (Tess Harper) and sharing custody of their adolescent daughter, Susan (Lori Laughlin, THE NEW KIDS, 1985)─is looking for a new place to live. A real estate agent offers John the Amityville house for a low price. John moves in.

Familiar AMITYVILLE things happen: flies constantly buzz around, inside and outside the house; the camera’s Demon POV, less zip-around-the-house than the it was in the first two films, watches people from within the house; new light fuses constantly pop and burn out; water faucets turn on, with nobody around and won’t turn off; then there’s the unsettling, boarded-over well in the basement . .

AMITYVILLE 3-D adds a scientific angle with its investigative characters (e.g., Melanie seeing the demon’s face hidden in a photo)─it’s moderately interesting for a few moments, but it’s mostly for naught: Orion Pictures, which put out AMITYVILLE II, got a lot of viewer complaints about how “tasteless” the dark, disturbing second entry was. The production company overcorrected and made its follow-up almost squeaky clean, aside from a few sly sex jokes made by Lisa (Meg Ryan), Susan’s classmate and best friend, who provides exposition about the house’s troubled history (Indian burial ground, spooky basement well, murders, etc.).

AMITYVILLE 3-D is also by-the-numbers in its execution. Even Howard Blake’s not-quite-histrionic soundtrack─less alarming than Lalo Schifrin’s first-film compositions and more emotionally heightened than Schifrin’s second-film compositions─can’t make the mostly ho-hum proceedings worthwhile. It does not help that some of the film’s scenes, shot for 3-D, are blurry even with the appropriate glasses. The 3-D effects are cheesy, better than the demonic FX Reveal at film’s end that, like AMITYVILLE II’s, are more suitable for an ALIEN (1979) flick.

The film briefly takes on an emotional, viewer-immersive edge when one of its key characters is killed, galvanizing John and others into action against the house. However, that viewer engagement─rendered potent by Tess Harper and Tony Roberts’s performances─ends quickly. 

As with the first two films, AMITYVILLE 3-D is populated by a standout cast and crew despite its studio-mandated, bleached-out tone. Director Richard Fleischer (SOYLENT GREEN, 1973) and screenwriter David Ambrose (THE SURVIVOR, 1981) keep AMITYVILLE 3-D moving along at a steady pace, the actors’ performances range from great to solid (e.g., veteran actors John Beal, DARK SHADOWS, 1970-1, as Harold Caswell, and Leora Dana, SOME CAME RUNNING, 1958, as Emma Caswell, are fun).

Not the worst AMITYVILLE flick, this is one you can skip unless you’re looking for a few instances of Eighties-cheesy FX and a mostly dull flick you can fall asleep to.

While AMITYVILLE 3-D did not bomb, it was not the money-maker Orion Pictures hoped for. Because of that, this was the last theatrically released AMITYVILLE entry until the 2005 remake of THE AMITYVILLE HORROR, which has not resulted in any further theatrical sequels. (Six direct-to-DVD sequels followed AMITYVILLE 3-D between 1989 and 2017.)

AMITYVILLE II: THE POSSESSION (1982)

 

(Director: Damiano Damiani. Screenplay by Tommy Lee Wallace and an uncredited Dardano Sacchetti, loosely based on Hans Holzer’s 1979 book, Murder in Amityville, re-released as Amityville: Fact or Fiction?)

Storyline

Before the storied Lutzes moved into 112 Ocean Avenue, the Montellis [cinematic stand-ins for the DeFeo family] did, with even more horrific results.

 

Review

AMITYVILLE II, released three years after THE AMITYVILLE HORROR (1979), is noticeably different than its source film.

AMITYVILLE II, a prequel, opens with an across-the-yard shot of the supposed devil abode. The Montellis─Anthony and Delores, with their four kids, various ages─arrive in three cars. Everything is idyllic until Sonny, the oldest, teenage son, is bullied by Anthony (Burt Young, THE AMITYVILLE MURDERS, 2018) for arriving five minutes after the rest of the family. Not long after that, Sonny sees something in the house’s iconic “evil eye” windows─something viewers are not shown.

Delores, Catholic mother, discovers the first-floor windows are nailed shut. A mover accidentally discovers a crawlspace-room in the cellar─an unlit, hidden room full of flies, stinking muck, and leaking water from the floor above. It’s not long before the camera POV switches to a fast-moving Demon POV (reminiscent of Sam Raimi’s THE EVIL DEAD, 1981). This Demon POV is often utilized to good effect throughout AMITYVILLE II.

In swift succession, more supranatural, how-do-you-explain-that stuff happens. Demon POV tracks an initially oblivious Sonny while he walks through house. A distorted, male voice speaks to him through his Sony Walkman headphones, uttering comforting lines like “Why didn’t you kill the pig?” (referring to Anthony). Soon after that, Sonny, sickly looking and creepy, seduces his slightly younger sister, Patricia (Diane Franklin, THE AMITYVILLE MURDERS, 2018).

The consensual incest between Sonny (Jack Magner, FIRESTARTER, 1984) and Patricia occurs off-camera. In the original cut, there was R-rated on-camera carnality, but test audiences complained mightily about it, so it was trimmed. Director Damiani wanted to push horrific boundaries with the film, especially this scene. Also trimmed, again because of test audience reactions, was a non-explicit anal rape scene involving Anthony and Delores.

While much of this violent, morally icky stuff happens (or doesn’t happen), Father Adamsky (James Olson, THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN, 1971) is in contact with the Montellis, trying to bless (then cleanse) the house, and later, trying to exorcise Sonny.

In its last half hour, AMITYVILLE II becomes a different kind of hybrid than its source film. It switches from its haunted house/possession storyline to a legal drama with tacked-on, blatantly thieved elements from THE EXORCIST (1973) and EXORCIST II: THE HERETIC (1977).

It’s a jarring shift, an unnecessary and overlong follow-through to the happenings of the previous hour-and-fifteen minutes. AMITYVILLE II, excellent as a nasty grindhouse flick up to that point, could have been wrapped up with a shot or two showing what happened to Sonny, or─given where the demon ends up─could have easily placed one of AMITYVILLE’s key characters at the house during the killing scenes. Also, there are a few instances where the creature/possession FX feel too over-the-top for the movie; most of it works, but when it doesn’t, it feels like more like a knock-off of ALIEN (1979) than an AMITYVILLE sequel.

That said, the last half hour of the film does not entirely ruin it. There is so much to appreciate in this underrated movie, e.g. its simple bookend final shot, which recycles its opening shot. It’s simple and effective.

The talent behind and in front of the camera is, as with the first film, worth noting. The overall look and tone of AMITYVILLE II is mood-effective, even when holy frak stuff happens, and Lalo Schifrin, composer from AMITYVILLE, takes a different approach in AMITYVILLE II─his score work is composed of quieter, sadder compositions, with occasional heightened PSYCHO-esque-alarm moments (whereas in the first flick the score was constantly loud, sharp, and nerve-jangling).

The cast furthers the excellence of AMITYVILLE II’s better parts. Burt Young gives a layered, wow-worthy performance as a tetchy, insecure, and scared guy who honestly seems to love his family, despite his vicious, lash-out temperament (e.g., when he hugs Sonny at a birthday party─there’s sad, palpable tenderness between them despite their violence and tension). Rutanya Alda (CHRISTMAS EVIL, 1980) also stands out as the wife and mother who’s trying to keep her oldest son and husband from killing each other, while living in a satanic, tantrum-throwing house. Jack Magner’s Sonny is a nuanced character as well, an angry, sweet-hearted young man who’s struggling to maintain his temper and sense of familial propriety while fending off an insidious invader. Diane Franklin imbues Patricia with a balance of innocence and desire in the lead-up to her family’s murders─this balance makes Father Adamsky’s post-slaughter focus on her slightly less pervy (even if the house hellspawn is preying on his guilt).

Other noteworthy actors try to transcend their characters, thinly sketched and genre-typical on the page. They don’t always succeed, but it’s good to see these players anyway: James Olson as Father Adamsky; Andrew Prine (THE LORDS OF SALEM, 2012) as Father Tom, Adamsky’s co-worker and fishing buddy; Leonardo Cimino (THE MONSTER SQUAD, 1987) as their Chancellor, who refuses to allow Adamsky to perform an exorcism on Sonny; Moses Gunn (FIRESTARTER, 1984) as Turner, a homicide detective whose later actions are plot-convenient unlikely; Allan Dellay (BLOODSUCKING FREAKS, 1976) as the “Judge” whose reaction to Sonny’s not guilty plea is fun.

Ultimately, AMITYVILLE II is worth watching, if you can pretend its last half hour, aside from Father Adamsky’s last scene and its bookend final shot, didn’t happen. With this film, Damiani and his cast and crew made a film that is, in many ways, a more viewer-resonant work by embracing the gritty, nasty, and sometimes tender dynamics of its events and characters in its first, taut hour and fifteen minutes─in this way, it maintains a more serious tonal balance that eschews the feel of the first film. Yeah, AMITYVILLE II’s last half hour flies off the rails, but prior to that this flawed but gripping flick has a grounded (if more squicky) quality that its source work lacked.

THE AMITYVILLE HORROR (1979)

 

(Director: Stuart Rosenberg. Screenwriter: Sandor Stern, screenplay based on Jay Anson’s book of the same name.)

Storyline

A dysfunctional, cash-strapped family move into what they believe is a demon-possessed house.

 

Review

1975. A year after the gruesome murder of the DeFeo family, the Lutzes─in emotional and financial distress─move into the cursed murder house, later revealed to be built on a Native American burial ground.

From the get-go, the briefly shown, melodramatic DeFeo murders set the tone for this atmospheric, blood-in-your-popcorn demonic house-possession flick. If you’re a viewer like me, you might laugh a lot, occasionally jump during the barrage-rush of AMITYVILLE’s miasmic mood and obvious-horror-trope terror scenes, which really put the unreliable in unreliable narrator, supposed occurrences that, if they happened, have easily spotted, non-supernatural explanations.

Some of these tropes include: flies swarming inside the house and on windows; demon-stalked Catholic priests and a nun, made sick by an unseen force; extreme, in-a-second temperature changes within the house and doors that slam by themselves, without warning; George Lutz (James Brolin, THE CAR, 1977) has trouble sleeping and routinely wakes up at 3:15 a.m., the exact time Ronald DeFeo Jr. killed his family (in real life he claimed he “heard voices”); the hidden, bizarre “red room” behind a basement wall; animalistic, glowing eyes appearing in windows; and so much more!

What makes this potboiler devil-haunted abode flick work is the talent involved in its making. Camera shots are seen in extreme closeups or from a distance, as if characters are being watched by an unseen someone or something. Lalo Schifrin’s constant-state-of-alarm score maintains the film’s pulse-racing tempo (whether those emotions are laughter or terror), Robert Brown’s editing further enhances Sandor Stern’s brisk, constant-jolts screenplay while Stuart Rosenberg’s direction matches its mood and pacing.

The cast, who often scream and yell at top volume at the drop of a penny, is great.

James Brolin’s George Lutz is a man under visible strain, pale and creepy as he stalks around the yard and house with a constantly sharpened axe. Margot Kidder (BLACK CHRISTMAS, 1974) is excellent as Kathy Lutz, an argumentative, passionate Catholic who hums the love theme to SUPERMAN, 1978, while washing dishes. Their name-changed kids, Greg (K.C. Martel, THE MUNSTERS’ REVENGE, 1981), Matt (Meeno Peluce, Dio’s  "THE LAST IN LINE" video, 1984, directed by Don Coscarelli) and Amy (Natasha Ryan, THE ENTITY, 1982) are appropriately reactive, especially Amy who’s enthralled by her imaginary, satanic-porcine friend, Jodie.

Rod Steiger (IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT, 1967) is volatile and loud as Father Delaney, who’s repeatedly attacked by the long-range demon. Don Stroud (SWEET SIXTEEN, 1983), as Father Bolen, imbues his secular psychiatrist-priest with quiet, urgent humanity. Murray Hamilton (JAWS, 1975) once again plays a bureaucrat (this time as Father Ryan, a church administrator) who puts maintaining the status quo above obvious human safety.

Other notable players include Helen Shaver (THE CRAFT, 1996) as Carolyn, the Lutzes’ psychically sensitive, basement-exploring acquaintance. Val Avery (FRIDAY THE 13^th:THE SERIES, 1988 episode) is his usual solid and understated self as Sgt. Gionfriddo, who’s called to 112 Ocean Avenue, after George reports a break-in, which appears to be a breakout.

AMITYVILLE’s climax is wow-cataclysmic, with an abrupt and crazy-shots finish. Based on Jay Anson’s supposedly nonfiction 1977 book, this is a risible, fun, and iconic late-Seventies flick.

Suggestion: if you buy it, try to purchase it used. Wouldn't want the con artists who perpetuated this hoax (George and Cathy Lutz, Ed and Lorraine Warren and their estates) to further profit from it.

MALASAÑA 32 (2020)

 

(a.k.a. 32 MALASANA STREET; director: Albert Pintó. Screenwriters: Ramón Campos, Gema R. Neira, David Orea and Salvador S. Molina.)

Storyline

A family, used to country living, moves into a big-city haunted house.

Review

Set in 1976, MALASAÑA starts off as a promising, drenched-in-dark-filtered-spookiness flick. Its building, exterior and interior, is baroque with long shadows and corners where one  expects creepy fingers to wrap around them. The acting is all-around good─their sense of desperate poverty and alienation with their surroundings is palpable.

Unfortunately, it’s only a few minutes before MALASAÑA meanders into annoying flash-cut-image moments, ineffective scenes that only pad out the film’s running time, and a few jump-cuts too many. When it becomes an EXORCIST-lite possession flick, it’s a by-the-numbers work. (I initially liked the twist involving Clara’s identity, but the film’s meandering script watered down her character, making her another bland ingredient in its soupy mess.)

MALASAÑA, a deeply flawed work, has talented people involved in it. It would have been better with a tighter script that was less choppy and capitalized on its Clara-related uniqueness (and given her character more depth and humanity). As it is, the hour-and-forty-four-minute flick feels like an empty exercise in sometimes-creepy style.

LAKE OF DEATH (2019)

 

(Director/screenwriter: Nini Bull Robsahm)

Storyline

A year after her twin brother’s mysterious death near their family cabin, Lillian and her friends return to the lakeside abode where he expired. Weird events and an expanding black rot─real or imagined?─impel the fragile sister toward another edge.

Review

DEATH is a loose remake of Kåre Bergstrøm’s 1958 Norwegian film, LAKE OF THE DEAD (based on André Bjerke’s novel, published under the nom de plume Bernhard Borge). In this slow (a generous viewer would call it “slow burn”) remake flick, a young woman (Lillian, played by Iben Akerlie), haunted and traumatized by the mysterious drowning death of her brother (Bjørn), returns to the lakeside family house where it happened.

Of course, she has friends─who bring their own bickering, weird energy to the trip─and strange things occur. Someone─nobody seems to know who─makes and sets out a big breakfast for them; Lillian’s dog (Totto) is found tied up in a barn; the friends discover a hidden basement with creepy photos and dolls, revealing Lillian’s family cabin to be that of a legendary old man in the 1920s who killed his family and drowned himself after staring at the lake for hours; Lillian, who sleepwalks, sees a black, disease-like rot spreading on everything, especially the temperamental Harrald, one of her friends who almost drowns in the lake when an unseen something tries to pull him under; doors open by themselves while several characters watch.

Director-screenwriter Robsahm creates a strong atmosphere of distrust and eerie unease, and the actors range from good (Akerlie’s Lillian) to solid (most other actors). The old man’s multi-language, pictures-of-creepy-wet-people diary is especially effective in adding a supernatural nuance.

Unfortunately, the film is overlong, with too many Lillian dream sequences and too much lag time between worthwhile scenes. By the time Lillian faces her fears─embodied, real or not, by Björn─it’s underwhelming, a too-little-too-late climax, with a sequel-friendly, typical ending. While the ending fits theme and set-up, it feels too overt, too pat, given the often-nuanced events that precede it. If you’re a fan of languid, mood-piece cinema, DEATH may appeal to you. If you prefer your horror to be faster paced, more plot- and character-driven, you may want to pass on this one.