The Amityville Horror (1979)

Too many fans seem to be blown away

Good start, but then it gets ruined

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

"The Amityville Horror" film claims to be based upon real events about supposed paranormal activities at a particular house where a family was terrorised. However, all this has been disputed since the release of the film. The plot is fairly good on the whole and includes some moments of atmosphere and suspense. One highlight, is when the babysitter is locked in the large cupboard and the child in her care just gazes at the locked door, ignoring the cries for help. We bear witness to the family in question as their idea of their dream home gradually becomes a nightmare. James Brolin and Margot Kidder don't employ much in the way of subtlety once their characters begin to feel the strain of living in a haunted house. For me, the acting honours go to Rod Steiger as a local priest who seems much in tune with the paranormal activity at the house. He conveys much in the way of Fear and torment. An arresting performance. Murray Hamilton and John Larch are wasted in their one scene appearance. The inevitable climax is one that tries to pull out all the stops but I was slightly disappointed with it. It wasn't dramatically effective enough for my liking. One considerable weakness in the plot, is that Rod Steiger didn't have a proper scene with either of the leads, which he should have done in order to provide some spiritual comfort. In addition, he should have been included for the climax. The direction is ok but nothing special and the pace tends to be rather leaden. The film has dated without question and I have seen far better haunted house movies. Worth seeing if only the once.

A young family move into a house where a young man killed his entire family. And they wonder why the house price was so low.Cue all manner of haunted house shenanigans- flies, crucifixes being turned upside down, the kids suddenly acquiring imaginary friends, red eyes being seen through the window at night, black ooze overflowing from the toilet...the list is endless.It feels like every camp and childish haunted house cliché has been poured into this movie that is actually based on a hoax. This sets the tone for the film.There are some funny moments though- watch out for the vomiting nun and the worst teeth brace you'll ever see. It looks like some kind of torture device.Also, Margot Kidder seems to be have some kind of naughty schoolgirl, proto Britney Spears vibe going on in this film. A bit pervy. Keep your fantasies in the bedroom, hun.

This is one of the scariest movies from the 70's. Amityville II The possession is scarier. Amityville 4 the evil escapes is also scarier. Amityville cures is also scarier. Amityville it's about time is also scarier. Amityville the new generation is also scarier. Amityville dollhouse is also scarier. The 2005 remake of The Amityville horror is also scarier. But still this is a very scary movie. It has a great story line. It also has great acting. It also has great special effects. 6.2 is underrating it. I give it 9 out of 10 because it is a great horror film. I need more lines and I am running out of thing to say.

Amityville Horror gets off to a rather clichéd start where our fairly average suburban family move into their new home (James Brolin and Margot Kidder complete with 2.4 children). However, soon after they move into the house strange things begin to happen which not only affect many of those within the immediate family, but also to several other people who visit the house.I'll be honest here and say that I'm probably over-selling this when I say that anything happens 'soon' in this film, because let's face it it doesn't. The biggest problem with this film is that the narrative for the most part is tedious and repetitive. Our family move into the house and we're treated to many minor creepy/shock moments which is all well and good, but these moments seem to do very little to advance the story and there are many occasions when the film seems like it's stuck in some kind of loop. Even though the narrative is the weakest part of the film, the writers do enough to keep you involved in the proceedings by at least making many of the characters interesting and for the most part more than one dimensional. Amityville Horror has many moments where it is very creepy and I'll admit that this film passed my own Horror film test (that feeling where you get that shudder down your spine). I think the main reason this film worked for me is that it used the characters and their experiences to create the scares rather than just using cheap tricks such as slamming a door or having an evil being appear out of nowhere (this is something that seems to plague many recent horror films and I'm glad that the writers didn't go down that road).The biggest selling point with this film lies with the acting; firstly, I thought Brolin was fantastic; whether he was playing the every day family man, or the psychotic man possessed by the demons he was simply terrific - he had a crazy convincing look in his eye that few actors seem to be able to pull off. Margot Kidder was also great and very convincing in her respective role.Going back to problems and one must ask themselves if this film really needed to be nearly 2 hours; I honestly feel that films of this nature should run somewhere between 80 and 100 minutes and the elongated running time of this film isn't helped by what appears on screen; Day 1... Day 5.... Day 8... Day 12.... Yawn!! Face Palm. Give me a break. This demon wants them out of the house, but it takes nearly 3 weeks for the family to finally up and leave. Really?Even though I've panned this a lot I have to admit that there is an awful lot to enjoy; the characters are interesting, the film is very creepy for the most part, there's never a dull moment and the performances from all that are involved are excellent. I'll be honest and admit that I even found the house to be creepy (although it was probably a selected filming location for that very reason).Yes, this is a flawed film, but when it's good it's very good and the good far outweighs the bad. It's not perfect, but it's far better than lot of the rubbish that we see nowadays.