#7: The Amityville Horror (1979)
One of my big interests is the paranormal. It makes sense, then, that The Amityville Horror, the book, has been at the top of my reading list for a while, despite constantly being bumped down by Sci-Fi from authors I keep hearing about. So I figured while I was doing this series I'd take a look at the movie incarnation to tide myself over until I have time for the book.
The big deal about Amityville is that it is a reportedly true story, which goes something like this:
On November 13, 1974, Ronald DeFeo, Jr., 23 years old, living with his parents and enamored of heroine and LSD, walked through his house and shot his parents and four siblings with a rifle while they slept. How did no one wake up with that much shooting going on? Unknown.
Thirteen months later the Lutz family buys the house at a bargain price, and move in with their three children. 28 days later they flee from the house, citing all kinds of crazy, paranormal demon-like events. Strange boils, voices, crucifixes turned upside down, green slime oozing from the walls(!!), ect. They're not shy about telling their story, and soon a book deal is struck, followed shortly by a movie adaptation.
A lot of you probably think the story is absurd. You're not alone. Various parts of the story have been picked apart and proven to be false. Almost everyone involved in the case seems unable to provide a single, consistent story. The murderer, DeFeo, has changed his story numerous times, and appears to be completely off his rocker. The Lutz's stories, while each horrifying, are very different. They comment that it's as if they "were each living in a different house." It should be noted, however, that each was given a lie detector test, and each showed to be telling the truth. Even the priest that was called in to bless the house has changed his story over the years, once telling police that he never entered the house, and later saying, on TV, that he entered and a voice commanded him to "get out." Could it be that whatever was in the house scrambled people's perceptions and memories?
DeFeo's public defendant once stated that he and the Lutzs had concocted the story together: he in order to strengthen DeFeo's insanity plea, and the Lutzs for the fame. But can you ever really trust a lawyer?
The movie itself is a brilliant recreation of these events, as described in the book, which is admittedly not a 100% accurate recreation of the "true" events. The film is dark and atmospheric, and don't be surprised if you find yourself paying a little more attention to the creaks your house makes at night. This era of film making, from the late 70's to the late 80's, has always been my favorite. Maybe it's just nostalgia for my childhood, but the film gave me a warm, happy feeling despite the action occurring onscreen. After watching Amityville, I finally feel like it's really October.
I can't end this without talking briefly about Margot Kidder (that's Lois Lane to most of you.) Margot is gorgeous in this film, a true beauty. I wish I could have met her in 1979, and not in 2004, when we did happen to meet.
Tallahassee isn't a small town, but the relatively young age of most of its inhabitants, college students, combined with their transient nature, has made it such that there isn't much of a "community" to speak of. Therefore, there isn't such a push to plan big events. I was psyched when I heard about the 1st (actually only) annual Tallahassee Comics Convention. My room mate, girlfriend, and I got on our nerd shirts and headed to the convention center. It was abysmal. The thing happened in a medium-sized meeting room with a few vendors and some guys who took every opportunity to dress up like Storm Troopers. Naturally my girlfriend was the only female in attendance, so every time we approached a new table all conversation of "favorite Mr. Spock quotes" ceased so that they would seem more macho... or something. Actually she wasn't the only female, because the big draw of this mocker... ahem, convention was "meet two Lois Lanes!"
So we had Margot Kidder, and hot-as-hell Erica Durance from Smallville, right? Incorrect. Lois Lane number 2:
83-year-old Noel Neill, from the 1948 Superman serials. Don't get me wrong, she was rocking it out, wearing her sequined Superman logo shirt and getting ten bucks a pop for autographs. People were hugging her and she was having a blast.
Margot Kidder looked like she was going to fucking murder someone.
She was probably unaccustomed to such small venues for starters. It also didn't help that no one wanted her autograph; the nerdlings were avoiding her booth like woodland animals fleeing the forest prior to a natural disaster. I picked up some old issues of The Huntress and we left.
Or so we thought. There wasn't much going on in the convention center that day, so only a single door was unlocked for us to leave by. Margot was standing outside, blocking our exit, screaming into her cell phone. We all just looked at each other and stood there for an abnormally long period of time. I was about to suggest that we might be able to break into the kitchen area and escape through the loading docks when it began to rain. Margot came inside.
She regarded us as though we were an extension of the conversation she was having on the phone. "Fucking Delta! Can't even talk to a person, and when you do they just put you on hold!" Then she blinks, and I swear to God she's another person entirely. Sweet, demure, she asks if we'd like free autographs. My girlfriend is too stunned to respond, and I can't quite figure out the best way to say "I hate Superman and your movies are one reason why." My room mate comes to the rescue, busting out a Superman issue and saving us all from The Wrath of Lois Lane. We smile and shake hands and exchange brief pleasantries, then the three of us dash, through the rain, away from her.
Her Wikipedia entry says she has bipolar disorder, and spent some time institutionalized. I'm thinking of adding to, quoting my buddy Josh: "That is a scary bitch."
But really, bipolar disorder is nothing to joke about, and I hope against hope that what I suffer from is just general discontent, and not early warning signs.
Getting back to the movie, Superman was often laughable, spinning the world on... oh right.
The Amityville Horror is the quintessential haunted house movie. It's really a horror flick that, regardless of the truth behind the story, makes you believe that it could really happen. Think The Exorcist, except it doesn't turn your stomach and generally make you feel sick. It's been argued that the success of The Exorcist might have been part of the inspiration for the Amityville hoax, if indeed a hoax it was. The film itself builds at a slow but steady pace, relying on your imagination more than you'd expect. The ending seemed anticlimactic, but if the family had had a face-to-face encounter with the undead, I would have been rolling my eyes. Besides, that's what we have Poltergeist for. Regardless of what really happened in that house 35 years ago, the movie remains a solid, creepy tale that will outlive all involved.
Z-Man sez: 7.5/10 (Which is sort of cheating; if I was going to do tenths of a point I should really assign 100 point maximums.)
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