The Amityville Horror Year: 2005 Director: Andrew Douglas Written by: Scott Kosar Threat: HOUSE (yup, all caps) Weapon of Choice: Shotgun Based upon novel - Jay Anson IMDb page:

Other movies in this series:
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Rish's Reviews
If this website had fans, I'm sure I'd get hatemail about my long, rambling reviews of late. Thank goodness that's not the case, huh?
Many moons ago, I was four years old. We had just moved into our new house, and I didn't yet have a bed in my room. My mom had made me a space to sleep on the floor with blankets and pillows, and our little dog was keeping me company there. I was not yet asleep when a breeze blew into the room, not from the window to outside, but into the room from the hall. Suddenly, our dog began to bark. She was looking up toward the ceiling, yapping away as if she saw a cat there. My mom came in to see what the matter was, but saw nothing, and there appeared no reason for the dog to go nuts like that. Mom asked what was going on and I said, "I think she was barking at the wind."
You probably know the "true" story of The Amityville Horror. Basically, George and Kathy Lutz and family move into a big, affordable house in Upstate New York, not knowing that a year before, a mass murder took place there. Kathy's daughter gets a new imaginary playmate Jodie who lives in the closet (or should I say "lives" in the closet), and soon George begins seeing things, hearing voices ("katch 'em, kill 'em"), and feeling cold and increasingly hostile toward his family.
I recently got to meet Ryan Reynolds and Melissa George in their promotion of the film. Reynolds I knew from the set of Van Wilder (I was a member of the nerd fraternity), and he was as cool now as then. Ms. George, shockingly considering she's as attractive as she is, seems to be a really nice person. I got a signed poster of the film I was going to give away on the site (probably in one of those contests nobody ever enters), but now that I've seen the flick, maybe I won't.
I'm gonna be honest: the trailer for the new Amityville Horror was scarier than the 1978 original flick was. But here's the thing: the movie was even scarier than the trailer. I saw it with a good friend of mine who does not like horror films, yet wanted to see it over everything else. From my shrieking, cringing behaviour, I highly doubt we'll be seeing future releases together. Yeah, I cried a little bit too. Like my dad used to say, the doctor forgot to tell him he had a daughter.
Holy moly, this was a scary movie. If I had to count its good, effective scares, I would reach the double digits. Even The Shining can't claim that. Little kid ghosts always scare me, especially little girl ghosts. This one was EXCELLENT. I had a conversation with tyranist the morning after seeing the movie, declaring that empirically, it was a scary film. He disagreed with me, not that it wasn't scary, but that everyone would find it scary. He told me the trailer didn't even unsettle him. SO I KILLED TYRANIST.
I don't think movies have an effect on us one way or another.
Joking aside, while I feel The Grudge was a more disturbing film, this one probably had more scares, whether traditional jolts, anticipatory tension, things jumping out, revolting images, or unsettling concepts. I commented that while I've seen six hundred horror films in the last handful of years, there was stuff in this flick that I'd never seen before (and we seldom saw the same scare twice). More disturbing or not, Amityville 2005 was a better movie than The Grudge, by far.
The film, directed and produced by the same dudes who brought us the remake of Texas Chainsaw, was really well done. Creative, interesting, unpredictable, and with a tight, excellent script, I am really surprised by how much I enjoyed this film. Especially since it was so torturous watching the original (twice). While I knew how it was all going to turn out, I was really afraid for the characters anyway. Ryan Reynolds, who my sister described recently as, "Like, the hottest guy EVER," was quite good in the role of George Lutz--intense, red-eyed, on edge, yet occasionally still funny. Melissa George, besides her obvious physical attributes, pulled off a wholly convincing American accent. The kids were fine, and I'm not really sure how you get a good performance out of child actors in this overprotective day and age.
The only real problem I had with the movie is that it fell into that trap that modern horror flicks and remakes get into, it felt the need to explain WHY everything was happening (why was the house haunted? Why did DeFeo and Lutz hear voices? Why was there something wrong with the lake? Why was it unhallowed ground?), when most audiences don't need an explanation (The Grudge and the American version of The Ring also did this, as did The Phantom Menace, Spider-man, Hulk, etc.). Like Billy Loomis said, "It's a lot scarier when there's no motive."
I did have nightmares too. Oddly, one of them included parachuting into enemy territory with Jessica Biel, but there was also the typical waking-up-gasping-because-the-dead- little-girl-was-standing-beside-my-bed-pawing-my-cheek-with-a-rotting-little-hand dream. You know the one.
A lot of people lately have enjoyed proving that the Lutzes' story was a fabrication, a money-making scheme, or an exaggeration. I guess I understand the need to write it off. But isn't the world a more interesting place if you believe the house was haunted?
I couldn't have guessed that a flick this year would scare me more than The Exorcism of Emily Rose. But here you are. It was the scariest movie of 2005. Maybe ever. Not bad for MGM's final release.
While this may be my longest review ever (is it?), I can't resist adding another line. If you have the chance to see this in the theatre before video or illegal download, that's where you ought to see it. Tyranist expressed doubt at the trailer's scariness after watching it on his computer, and I'm certain he wouldn't have thought so had he seen it on the big screen beside me. In fact, we'd probably have clutched onto each other like the world's fattest (and hairiest) children.
Talk about scary.
Best Scare: Myriad. If I had to pick one, it would be the absolute sickest one, toward the beginning, where they totally got my guard down by wondering if I would see Melissa George naked, only to thrust the most horrible image imaginable before my eyes. I'm still a little freaked out by it and I'm sure my screams still echo throughout the Westwood multiplex.
I'd Recommend It To: Big ole Horror fans. Oh, but you gotta be strong, son. Can you be strong?
Note: I just can't resist. I'll tell you what, the first person to write and disagree with me on how scary this movie is wins an insulting prize. Come on, I'm at RishOut@aol.com. Tell me how you've been more freaked out by the Teletubbies.
Posted: June 20, 2005

Total Skulls: 27

Sequel
Sequel setup
Rips off earlier film
Horror film showing on TV/in theater in movie
Future celebrity appears
Former celebrity appears
Bad title
Bad premise
Bad acting
Bad dialogue
Bad execution
MTV Editing
OTS
Girl unnecessarily gets naked
Wanton sex
Death associated with sex
Unfulfilled promise of nudity
Characters forget about threat
Secluded location
Power is cut
Phone lines are cut
Someone investigates a strange noise
Someone runs up stairs instead of going out front door
Camera is the killer
Victims cower in front of a window/door
Victim locks self in with killer
Victim running from killer inexplicably falls
Toilet stall scene
Shower/bath scene
Car stalls or won't start
Cat jumps out
Fake scare
Laughable scare
Stupid discovery of corpse
Dream sequence
Hallucination/Vision
No one believes only witness
Crazy, drunk, old man knows the truth
Warning goes unheeded
Music detracts from scene
Death in first five minutes
x years before/later
Flashback sequence
Dark and stormy night
Killer doesn't stay dead
Killer wears a mask
Killer is in closet
Killer is in car with victim
Villain is more sympathetic than heroes
Unscary villain/monster
Beheading
Blood fountain
Blood spatters - camera, wall, etc.
Poor death effect
Excessive gore
No one dies at all
Virgin survives
Geek/Nerd survives
Little kid lamely survives
Dog/Pet miraculously survives
Unresolved subplots
"It was all a dream" ending
Unbelievably happy ending
Unbelievably crappy ending
What the hell?