Amityville: The Awakening

Amityville the Awakening is finally here after many, many push-backs and delays. Was it worth the wait? Well like many films that use the Amityville name, not really.

The cinematography is fine, the actors are okay. One of the biggest issues with the film itself is the audio, there are plenty of scenes where dialog is drowned out by background sound.

The film starts off on a good step, using what looks like old police footage to explain about the Defeo murders, unfortunately from there the movie makes a steady decline into worthlessness.

Instead of making the movie about the house, murders and haunting, they choose to focus on a bratty girl and her vegetable of a brother. The haunting takes a back seat to the family drama, which makes the movie even worse. Poor pacing, poor writing, the movie is less than thrilling.

Let's put it this way, there's a reason why they opted for a limited theatrical release and putting it up for free on Google play in October through December. It's a film even the producers and directors can't stand behind.

The reality is, the original Amityville was popular because it was portrayed as a true story, so the family drama was more humanized. With these other films, it's about the horror and this film completely ignores that.

I really wanted to like this movie - I went into with an open mind not really knowing what to expect from it as I had not read any of the reviews.

For me it lacked atmosphere, reminiscent of a made-for-TV or direct to DVD movie.

The idea of a family moving into the actual Defeo house 40 years on was an intriguing premise, but what I could not get past was the fact that the eldest daughter had no idea about the house and it's history until her new-found friends informed her, along with it's grisly back- story. Had she been living under a rock? At first I thought - OK, the movies don't exist in this universe but then they actually mention the movies, sequels and remake and even venture to watch the 1979 original.

Still, it was watchable and although there were the usual clichéd horror tropes it did hold my interest until the end.

"Amityville: The Awakening" is the tenth installment in the "Amityville" series (but honestly, who's counting anymore?), and it follows Belle, a teenager girl who move into the famed 112 Ocean Avenue with her mother, little sister, and brain-dead twin brother on life support. Bad things happen, including her brother become a vessel for demonic energy.

It's been a long road for "Amityville: The Awakening": I remember seeing trailers at the movie theater for it at least two years ago, but it had numerous delays in typical Weinstein Company fashion—it also, if my suspicious are correct, was chopped to pieces by the Weinstein Company's subsidiary Dimension Films, who distributed (or were supposed to distribute) the film.

I have a soft spot for the "Amityville" movies, and have found even the worst of the installments at least amusing—what can I say? I love a haunted house flick. "The Awakening" starts out rather nicely with atmospheric, mundane goings-on as the family settles in, punctuated by genuinely chilling moments: On their second day in the home, the little sister says to Belle that their brother, James, has been cursing at her. The punchline? James is brain-dead and in a vegetative state. These sorts of moments in "The Awakening" genuinely work, and Franck Khalfoun's script gets meta when Bella and her outcast friends have an "Amityville Horror" movie marathon at the Amityville House. As they're watching the infamous "red room" scene from the 1979 original, the power goes out; it's 3:15am. While this move is risky in that it relegates all the other "Amityville" films to fiction, it's clever.

Unfortunately, as the film progresses, things get sloppier and sloppier; uneven editing and pacing matches uneven development of plot lines that are fairly one-note to begin with. About three- quarters of the way through, one begins to realize that there really is not much happening; the subtleties of the first act lead to payoffs that are frankly not that interesting. As I mentioned before, it's difficult to say who is at fault for the film's shortcomings, as the Weinsteins are notorious for cutting films to pieces (see "Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers," or "Cursed" for reference), and a lot of the issues come from what seems to be bad editing. Franck Khalfoun proved himself a talent in my eyes with 2007's "P2," and with people like Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kurtwood Smith, and Jennifer Morrison on board, there is considerable talent here. The young cast is even quite good, with Bella Thorne playing a sympathetic lead.

In the end, "Amityville: The Awakening" is actually one of the better sequels in the series, if we can call it that, and while it does offer some subtle and clever moments, it spins its wheels in the last act and errs into a rote, albeit shoddily-pieced-together conclusion. For series diehards, it's a must-see for the reasons I've stated above, but in general, it's a fairly unremarkable effort. 6/10.

After countless years in pre and post production, this movie finally arrived to us in late 2017. I'll admit I kind of forgot about it, and just watched it last night (December 19, 2017). The movie just wasn't interesting to anybody anymore because of the constant release changes. In fact, the movie was only released in ten United States theaters and made about $700. But, enough about the movie statistics. Let's talk about the movie itself.

Amityville: The Awakening stars Bella Thorne, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Cameron Monaghan, and Mckenna Grace. These characters move into the haunted Amityville house located in Amityville, New York. This is the same house that Ronald DeFeo Jr. murdered his entire family 40 years ago. However, the mother is keeping this a secret from her children. Bella (Bella Thorne) finds this out the hard way when kids at her new school bring it to her attention. The freaky and supernatural begins with James (Cameron Monaghan), who is in a coma, is suddenly awake and able to communicate. Well, this must be supernatural. Turns out it is. James is possessed by a demon. And he wants to murder his entire family in the same vein as Ronald DeFeo Jr. Oh, and it's up to Belle to save herself and her sister, Juliet (Mckenna Grace), because their mom (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is pretty much a supernatural worshiper because she moved to the house with the intention of the supernatural possessing Jason to make him better.

Sounds like a good movie? Yeah, on paper, it sounds like the generic fun summer horror flick. However, it is quite dull in areas, and the scares are pretty low, which is unfortunate, considering this is technically an Amityville movie. However, suspense was actually quite high, and acting was somewhat good. The few times I did jump were during cheesy jump scares like when it's just the girl behind her sister. Overall, I am going to have to give film a 5/10. I watched it and was entertained enough to watch the whole thing (it is only 87 minutes, though). I would only recommend this to some horror fans. Not everybody will be as generous with their rating.

The seventeen year-old Belle Walker (Bella Thorne) moves to Long Island with her mother Joan (Jennifer Jason Leigh), her little sister Juliet (Mckenna Grace), her comatose twin brother James (Cameron Monaghan) and her aunt Candice (Jennifer Morrison). James suffered an accident and depends on the life support equipment to survive. His neurologist Dr. Milton (Kurtwood Smith) knows that the braindead James will not recover but Joan does not accept the truth and has high-hopes that her beloved son will recover. When Belle goes to school, she learns that her address is the notorious Amityville house where a father killed his family forty years ago. Belle discovers blood stains under the wallpaper of her room and soon mysterious things happen in the house. When James recovers after a flat line, Belle believes an evil thing has possessed he brother.

"Amityville: The Awakening" is another Amityville horror film with terrible story and poorly written screenplay. The characters are not well developed and the conclusion is deceptive. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Amityville: O Despertar" ("Amityville: The Awakening")