Yet another remake of an older horror movie, this remake of the 1979 film of the same name is better than the original but it is not going to remembered for anything extraordinary. The best thing about the movie is the performance by Ryan Reynolds. He did an outstanding job. The movie was scary but not terrifying.
This movie is very much loosely based on the events that happened to the real life George and Kathy Lutz in Amityville New York, in December 1975. The Lutz’s had bought a home that had been the place where a whole family was murdered by the older son, who claimed while he was on trial that he heard voices that told him to murder his family. The Lutz’s were told what happened before they purchased the house and went ahead and did it anyway. Twenty eight days after moving in, George Lutz left all of his possessions, including clothes, and took his family to relatives and abandoned the house. Since that time there have been many stories about it being a hoax and about it being real.
The movie however, follows the basic premise of the movie, including showing the murder of the Defeo family by Ronald. George, played by Ryan Reynolds (Blade III), and Kathy, played by Melissa George (Down with Love,) Lutz move into the house even though they are told by the realtor what happened a year earlier. Almost immediately, George begins seeing visions and Kathy’s daughter Chelsea, gets a new friend named Jodie. It turns out that Jodie is the daughter of the Defeo’s and the last child killed by Ronald. George meanwhile begins to be possessed by the house and his demeanor changes over the course of 28 days. Kathy goes into town and finds out that there was some kind of torture chamber for Indians in the basement of the house. However by then George has become possessed and is going to try and kill the family. Scare wise there is nothing new. It uses lots of shadows moving around and weird sounds and large thumps and so on that are your standard in haunting movies. It was unnerving to see the little girl as apart of the scare tactics. The very first night in the house she appears to George as being hung above the bed. Movies are starting to use little girls and children in general as tools to scare which is good because of every one’s nature to want to protect them and to show them in scenes of death add to that fear. The bad thing is that if Hollywood is forced to use these children as scare tactics, they must be running out of ideas to scare people with.
I am finding it interesting that Hollywood is also remaking horror movies from the 60’s and 70’s. With the previously released Dawn of the Dead, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and the soon to be released House of Wax, it would appear that other than the Japanese invasion of horror stories, Hollywood is now remaking stuff that was already done. I guess they are running out of ideas, or there is no one in Hollywood with original thoughts. Which means in another 10 years we will have remakes of Friday the 13th and Halloween, I weep for the future of Hollywood horror.
Ryan Reynolds was a bright spot in the movie. He did a great job with creating a character that must become evil from good. Playing a character that is real and alive must be difficult for an actor, but he makes him believable. Lutz’s character is the star of the show as is the little girl(s). Both Chloe Grace Moretz and Isabel Conner do great job as Chelsea Lutz and Jodie Defeo respectively. Every time Jodie showed up, I wasn’t scared as much as I was angry that a child was hurt. Still it was a good effort by both and hopefully both of these girls can continue to get more jobs if for nothing else than to give Dakota Fanning a break so she can go to school.
The script followed your basic house haunting movie. Screenwriter Scott Kosar appeared to me to venture very far away from the “true” story of the Lutz’s. George Lutz offered to be a consultant for the show but was declined. Probably because Kosar’s script looks like it stole some ideas from our Japanese friends across the Ocean, except for the whole indian burial ground thing which is WAY over used. As does the director Andrew Douglas, who steals from Japanese movies, particularly The Ring and/or The Grudge. The little girl Jodie is all black and looks like she was drowned with a hole in her head, even though she was shot with a shot gun in her bedroom.Not very consistent.
There was some cheese in the movie. The whole scene with the babysitter who was probably 19 or 20, first hitting on a 13 year old kid, and then getting trapped in the closet where Jodie was found dead was completely a cheap scare scene and not very good. The very last scene where Jodie is standing in the house all alone, crying because the Lutz family left, and then get grabbed by hands and pulled through the floor was not scary or unnerving, just stupid.
But the movie is not that bad. There are some scenes that are pretty good. Go ahead and see the movie, there are a lot worse movies out there, but it is not the best. But should be good for a scare or two for your girlfriend, maybe even boyfriend.
The official BBMC Blog for Brian "The Naked Gun" Felts 