The Amityville Horror (Stuart Rosenberg, 1979)

Following a gruesome series of murders, the home at 112 Ocean Avenue in Amityville, New York is bought by George and Kathy Lutz (James Brolin and Margot Kidder, respectively).

As the family tries to settle into their new home, a series of bizarre disturbances destroy whatever domestic bliss they are seeking...

Time for another deep-dive into a horror franchise I have never seen!

It is hard to write about this movie without falling into the footprints of Stephen King’s review from Danse Macabre.

The least scary parts of the movie are the overtly supernatural shenanigans (the big exception is Margot Kidder catching a look of her daughter’s imaginary friend ‘Jody’s’ glowing eyes at the window).

The film has the most juice when it is just James Brolin worrying about how he is going to pay his bills.

That scene where he finds the empty money band and screams is terrifying. 

Speaking of James Brolin, he is not an actor I have thought much of. 

I am happy to eat crow now.

This is the first movie I have seen where he is not just good, but he is the movie’s standout.

He is a powder keg from the beginning.

There is one scene where he goes for histrionics and it is laughable, but that is one moment. 

Brolin’s default seems to be amiability.

Here he is constantly on edge. Right from the beginning, when he is snapping at the realtor, there is a rage to Brolin that I have never seen before - an impatience that radiates through every interaction.

For most of the film, he is the film's sole source of threat, a loaded gun waiting to go off.

Watching this movie after The Shining and Poltergeist does it no favours.

It lacks the latter’s sense of narrative momentum, and it is not aiming to burrow into the characters’ psychology like Kubrick’s masterpiece. There is nothing elliptical about Amityville - this house is haunted by a satanic presence.

But unlike Poltergeist, we never grow close enough to the family to really care about their plight. Brolin's financial troubles are closest thing these people get to any kind of specificity.

Rod Steiger’s subplot as the priest is so superfluous it felt like the role was beefed up because of the casting. I do not think the priest ever actually interacts with the family, except over the phone.

The priest scenes are the most obvious culprit but this is a movie that feels too shaggy to build or sustain any real sense of claustrophobia or tension. While the family are not that developed, every time we cut away from the house, the movie completely deflates.

Aside from Brolin's hair-trigger performance, there is nothing particularly horrific about Amityville. 

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