The Amityville franchise is almost a punchline at this point with the number of sequels, spin-offs, and movies that tried to prop themselves up on the name, but that doesn’t stop some of the more hardcore fans from hating on 2005’s The Amityville Horror. The Ryan Reynolds-led remake of the 1979 movie of the same title, and without getting too deep into the weeds on where it came from, we see the words, “Based on a true story,” at the beginning. The tale is mostly taken from Jay Anson’s book from 1977 about the Lutz family moving to a house in Amityville, New York, where Ronald DeFeo Jr. murdered his family. The house’s new inhabitants were said to have witnessed supernatural phenomena, but there’s a large rabbit hole someone could crawl down when it comes to the story’s validity.
The movie is similar to the original but changes quite a few things, chiefly the depth of George’s possession. The 2005 remake jumps into the horror a bit faster, getting the story moving while leaving out some of the atmosphere and tension building. It’s a sweet 90 minutes of runtime, and it tries not to waste any of that when a jumpscare can say it all. There are still some good scenes and solid elements, but it doesn’t embrace any sort of subtlety, opting to show rather than suggest while turning everything up a bit, seemingly for purposes of modernizing the script while still keeping it in the appropriate period.
I think the film is genuinely put together decently, but like that old house that’s too good to be true, some blemishes shouldn’t be overlooked. Although I’m a fan of many of the visuals, some of those cornerstones of early ‘00s filmmaking are hard to ignore, the seizure-inducing flashes and wild cuts being a primary example. These elements are distracting in the flashbacks, taking away from the story to some extent and interrupting a few moments that should be more chilling. The crew did a wonderful job making the house feel genuinely creepy, but it also retains some of that cheesy feeling as well, causing a slightly skewed tone.
Some of the visual presentation is weakened by a few silly jumpscares and humorous scenes. It’s like these haunting entities are just trying to hang out with the new inhabitants to show off their excellent makeup work rather than harm or scare them away. Sure, televisions and projectors showing home movies can be creepy until the demon face on the oldest kid comes up awkwardly, and I want the ability to scream at my apartment until it’s clean, but the effect of her being pulled under the floor didn’t look great. There is a cheapness to some moments, like when the mom is supposedly hit with an axe, only for it to be revealed immediately that it was a hallucination. When the babysitter yells BANG-BANG-BANG during her story, I believe her, but the film thinks it needs to emphasize this in an over-the-top way (I also believed her when she said she sucks at this job). We see too much of the ghosts at times, especially Jodie DeFeo, who is greatly changed from the original.
I have zero clue why she shows up during the sex scene, especially being hanged since she was killed by a gunshot wound to the head, but who am I to tell malevolent forces they can’t be expressive? Jodie clearly has a sense of humor, forcing the babysitter to put her finger in that gunshot wound on her forehead and reenacting the blast that killed her. The kid should have been in theater. No wonder the Lutz family left her in the house with the evil spirits when they escaped. For everything that doesn’t quite work, there are a few, like the aforementioned, that land quite well. When George walks into the closet and doesn’t see her stuck to the ceiling, being restrained at the top by large grasping hands (something that will happen to him later in the bathtub; this movie has specific kinks), that image stuck with me.
Ryan Reynolds plays George Lutz in this film and it’s a role that sticks out to some people, being quite different than his usual performances (hey, it was almost James Van Der Beek). The humor is dialed back a bit, his aggression is raised, and audiences see an abusive side that is quietly haunting in a few scenes when he isn’t just dropping lines like, “How’d you get so fucking stupid?” We see his character go through a lot, more than just being cold and having bad dreams, causing him to vomit and curl up outside on the dock, he’s on a steady decline while being tortured by that damn dog, whatever is in the basement, and these kids.
“These kids are out of control.”
Reynolds has a wonderful chemistry with the children, and some of their dialogue feels genuine, but the actor kept himself isolated from the young performers so he wouldn’t feel bad about yelling and mistreating them later in the film. The distance meant the kids rarely saw Ryan outside of their scenes, and supposedly, some of the younger actors didn’t think he liked them, but sometimes sacrifices must be made for the craft. That, or it was a clever excuse not to be around kids. I wish I had thought of that.
The beautiful and charming Melissa George plays Kathy Lutz, the mother of the children and new bride to George, who wants more for her family and gets stuck between her oldest son, Billy (Jesse James), not quite accepting their new stepfather, and must protect them from her lover when things get more chaotic. There are some excellent scenes with the maternal character and she shines even more toward the end after Kathy begins to piece things together, unraveling the mystery of the house and even calling in help in the form of Father Callaway (Philip Baker Hall), a role that was reduced from the original. This is also the film debut for Chloe Grace Moretz as Chelsea Lutz, the young daughter who is communicating with the dead, but it’s also notable that she performed several of her stunts, like the roof walk, at quite a young age. There’s also another brother, Michael (Jimmy Bennett), but he’s the annoying one.
I also want to mention Lisa (Rachel Nichols, a role Megan Fox auditioned for), the babysitter, who was the epitome of nerddom in the original and made to be the stunningly hot, bad girl here. I’m not sure who dresses like that for a gig to watch kids, but George knows what’s up. Yeah, she’s doing bong rips in the bathroom, scaring the kids with true crime stories, and talking to Billy about French kissing. The actress keeps sticking out her tongue in a teasing fashion as well, which is apparently why Billy was given a KISS poster on his wall, so Nichols could mimic Gene Simmons. Lisa’s not good at the job, but she has a reason for being there since she also was a babysitter for the DeFeo family. She has the motivation to get back into the house, a morbid curiosity, and perhaps even a desire to flirt with death again, and she is granted a potentially worse fate. This is an example of when The Amityville Horror teases more of the extended lore (later with the basement), wanting to expand on the story even if it doesn’t follow through, it’s interesting.
Oh, there’s a family dog named Harry. Wait! Do most people know there’s a website that tells viewers if the dog dies in a movie or not? Really, doesthedogdie.com, and I give my wife crap about it sometimes (lovingly). In the original film, George actually risks his life further to run back into the house and save the animal, but in the remake, our hero kills the dog because he’s tricked into thinking it’s a demon. I’m cutting him a lot of slack here. The house manipulated George, but some people were incredibly upset the movie had him murder the family pet. I’m sure it bothered him, though, as he was still hearing that barking long after the thing was dead (no real animals were harmed, and the crew loved Red, the dog actor).
Some excellent acting, strong visuals, and a little atmosphere worked for the film, even if other aspects were causing some people to roll their eyes. The Amityville Horror remake killed it at the box office, financially at least, especially considering the low budget. It wasn’t shown to critics, which is usually a bad sign, but the majority of reviewers didn’t enjoy it anyway, even if most found at least one or two aspects to praise (some just really liked the house). There was also a small controversy with the real George Lutz, who claimed the studio didn’t have the right to make a new movie without his input and was suing, an assertion that’s hard for me to buy if most people don’t believe these events actually happened, but there were contracts involved. It wouldn’t matter, however, because Lutz passed away before the issue was resolved, just a little over a year after The Amityville Horror was released. Needless to say, it doesn’t seem like he was a fan of that one. If his death so close to the film seems a little creepy, there was also a dead body that washed up by the house during filming and a few other odd happenings.
For a film from a first-time director – Andrew Douglas started as a photographer, having some music videos and a documentary under his belt by that point – he almost nailed the dreaded horror remake right out the gate. I think most people can agree that if the realtor won’t follow you into the basement on a tour of the house, then you should run, but good luck getting a general consensus on this movie. I enjoyed it and would certainly say give it a shot, but I understand it won’t work for everyone. It’s hands down better than many other titles with the Amityville name attached, and none of them have sexy, muscular Ryan Reynolds, shirtless and chopping wood.
