Amityville: il ritorno

First of all, this wasn't meant to be an "Amityville" sequel, it just tried to draw its audience by using that word in the title, but otherwise has little to do with what has happened before it in the series. That would be OK if they had come up with a good flick anyway - but they didn't. Do you find it a good idea for a horror movie to give away its own surprises halfway through? If not, then avoid this one. (*1/2)

THE AMITYVILLE CURSE is a junk addition to the AMITYVILLE HORROR franchise. It's an entirely forgettable production that looks and feels like any old low budget haunted house flick as there's no real connection to the other films in this series. What we have is a very typical horror film in which a group of friends move into a dilapidated old house in order to renovate it but instead find themselves menaced and then possessed by a gang of spooks.

By all accounts this was an early straight-to-video film and that shows in its level of ineptitude. Absolutely nothing happens in this production that we haven't seen done better in other horror films and the various scare scenes are a joke. The direction is probably the worst thing about this, as he chooses to shoot most of his scenes in the dark so that the viewer is straining to see what's going on. The only familiar member of the cast for me was the lead, Kim Coates, who's gone on to appear in the likes of BLACK HAWK DOWN, but like the rest of the actors he gives an entirely undistinguished performance.

The Amityville Curse ... oh boy, where to begin.

A priest is shot to death while in his confessional booth by an unknown assailant. That booth is then stored in the basement of his house for some reason. Flash forward 12 years later, we meet two couples (Marvin & Debbie, Frank & Abigail) and a single friend of theirs named Bill who all buy that house formerly owned by the murdered priest. They plan on fixing it up and renting it out I think (the movie never goes into details on that).

Our Amityville 5 heroine Debbie is someone who experiences premonitions in her day to day life, so as soon as she enters the house her senses are triggered by the evil surrounding her. She quickly freaks out at literally everything that happens in the house. We get black cats, a creepy basement, and a ghost hanging from a tree outside the house. None of which connects to anything or makes any kind of sense. Eventually we see an unknown assailant (the same person who killed the priest) knock off a few more people. This leads to the discovery of who that killer is and the knowledge that they are in fact possessed by the curse of Amityville. It comes down to seeing if Debbie will survive the final act against the killer, a final act that manages to be somewhat intense and well done.

The fact is this is an Amityville sequel by name only. It carries the series name, but does not have anything to do with the DeFeo's or Lutz's or even that Baxtor family from the 3-D sequel. It suffers with a bit of an identity crisis as well. It wants to be a haunted house Amityville sequel, but also plays the murder mystery of who killed the priest twelve years ago (by the way, it is extremely obvious who the killer is about 15 minutes in). The movie never takes a direction with a specific plot and sticks to it.

The acting was a particularly weak point. Most are relatively unknown Canadian actors who are clearly out of their element. Even Kim Coates (who I expect a bit more from) looked bored during 90% of his scenes. The characters also aren't fun or interesting at all, which made me feel absolutely nothing when most of them met their demise.

The Amityville Curse is a cheaply made horror movie about ghosts and a murder mystery, nothing to do with Amityville at all other than it is set on Long Island. The final 15 minutes is actually creepy and done well, but to get through over an hour of absolutely no scares and really bad dialogue and no story direction is NOT worth it.

Luckily, the series gets much better after this.

2/10

My review was written in May 1990 after watching the movie on Vidmark video cassette.

"The Amityville Curse", the fifth film about the Long Island spook house, is a rather tame home video entry made in Canada.

Based on Hans Holzer's book rather than the Jay Anson novel, pic is set 12 years after the murder of a priest at David Stein's family and friends are arriving at the haunted house.

Poltergeist phenomena begin occurring with increasing frequency, driving worrywart Dawna Wrightman to distraction. At the climax, Kim Coates goes nuts and terrorizes Wrightman as if possessed. Ending is perfunctory.

Lacking good effects, pic is of little interest to genre fans. Its best chance is as a time-killer in a tv syndication package.

When I decided to binge watch the Amityville films I hadn't seen before I feared the worst. Partially because they've hardly impressed me and partially because the IMDb ratings for them were really poor.

Starring Kim Coates this one screams milking the franchise, it doesn't look or feel like an Amityville film in fact I think it's barely even acknowledged twice maybe three times throughout.

Random visions, a person possessed and a whole lot of nothing is what you can expect from these 90 minutes of sheer unadulterated boredom.

Terrible flawed storyline, lackluster performances and very little to draw your attention for a moment let alone maintain it.

The Good:

Nope

The Bad:

The psycho music, really!?

Unforgivably boring

Was that even the Amityville house?

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

I learnt that this Amityville binge might have been a bad move