Wordiezett So much average

Protraph Lack of good storyline.

CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Hayden Kane There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Fella_shibby Saw this on a VHS in the mid 80s. Revisited it recently on a DVD. To be honest, i found the movie to be tedious n tame then. Now i jus forwarded some boring scenes. The film opens on a dark and stormy night as we hear gunshots and see flashes of light through the home's famous eye-like upstairs windows as an entire family is killed. A new family moves in after a year n unsettling things begin to occur. Ther are scenes where the walls drip blood. Was it blood or tar i don't know. Whose blood it was or where it came from was never explained. There's a hidden room in the house the dog always barks at. In one scene James Brolin climbs the stairs above that room, only to fall through them and into a pit of the same blood/tar. Was that suppose to be comedic? Also the scene involving Rod Steiger with the flies wasn't scary at all. The movie was boring considering the length n nothing happens. Somewhere around 01.16, Josh Brolin breaks open a wall n his facial expressions n eyes r epic scene man. What he sees that makes him so startled, we never come to know n we don't get to see also. The film is helped by an extremely creepy score composed by Lalo Schifrin n Brolin delivered a good performance. Margot Kidder did a decent job.

thiszizlife The fly scene with the priest will never get old. Then never resolves to anything substantial. We find something is disturbing the priest enough that he pukes outside by his car. Everything seems find for George and the gang. They had to have been drinking TAB soda as they were fixing up the place. Haven't seen that soda in a while. Love how Stuart Rosenberg adds in the old stuff, too. Them old school wall pencil sharpeners in the kitchen and, rotary phone. There is something about this place that George likes since, he buys one of the old lamps that broke during the murder that took place there. The dialogue for starters in this film is family-like. And Kathy and George are a trip. George gets cold and says. "This house is supposed to be well- insulated." Where did this line come from? Why inform us of this now and not when the realtor was present. Skipping ahead to the love scene, it could be better. I like how he looks at her and says, "Kathy, I love you." This also builds feeling in both characters and we see them as humans and we feel for them. Great job! Rosenberg. This film carries us through a destructive tide of disorder at its best. That family dinner table fight. That car argument with someone. I think we have all been there and can relate. Rosenberg knows this and does a great job of bringing this out during the babysitter closet scene. The real incident of this took place in New York, resident address of 112 Ocean Avenue. This did not take place in Detroit. This kind of ruins the authenticity factor. Yep, that went right out the door. And, there was no car being possessed in the original story. The use of atmosphere makes this film enjoyable. Some houses are just creepy and this is one of them. Those old houses with those stairway basements are just nasty! Kathy would be much better off with Father Bolen. This film suggests that. That we never really see the good until it's too late and we are stuck in marriage. A lot of this film sucks you into nothing happening scenes that could very well be omitted. Things start to pick up towards the end of the film and Rosenberg I think is at his best. Lot of unnecessary effects that steal the suspense. I would have loved the run through action in this film a lot better without the musical score. In a film like this you want to hear the screams, be involved in the tension build up of what's going on with the characters, and not detached from them by this music. The main theme in the credit roll would have been better if Rosenberg utilized it during George's walkarounds of the boathouse.

GL84 After moving into a new house together, a woman grows increasingly concerned about her husband's new behavior around and comes to believe their new house is haunted forcing her to find a way of stopping it from continuing.On the whole this is one of the more overrated efforts in the genre. There's not a whole lot here that works, and nearly all of that is tied in with the different supernatural antics on display which are only mildly suspenseful and thrilling. As the most notorious scene here for a reason, the encounter in the room with the flies manages to work incredibly well as the progressing swarm around his face and the louder buzzing get great suspense built up within here which naturally sets up the booming evil whispers which really comes off as creepy and chilling as possible. Elsewhere, other scenes here that come of nicely are all in the finale, from the howling voices and demented workload trying to get out of the basement as the growing pit and spackled wall coming down are off-set with the realization of the creepy back-story and the action to get away which is pretty much all that works here, along with the overall look and appearance of the house for the film's positives. There's a few flaws here that makes this one very troubling, most of which is tied in the film's insistence that his activities are chilling when they're really not. From his constant complaining about being cold, to constantly chopping firewood, snapping angrily at her, the kids, family or anyone around him and turning everything around him into the biggest deal doesn't come off as scary despite being set-up as the main scares here, as well as being boring and quite unimpressive at building an interesting story. This carries into the rest of the scare attempts here which are just as bland and boring by focusing on utterly non- threatening scare attempts as everyone here claims something's off about the house but nothing is done to ensure that these are creepy since everyone simply mentions something but is never paid off. Others are brought up and simply ignored, which makes them questionable inclusions as well, all furthering the fact that there's absolutely nothing that should keep the family in the house as long as what happens here and should've forced them out sooner regardless of how effective they are as scares. These here are what hold this down.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Brief Nudity, a long but very mild sex scene, and Adult Language.

TheBlueHairedLawyer I've never really been a fan of horror movies that become a large series of repetitive franchises (Resident Evil, Paranormal Activity, Insidious, etc.) but what makes me love this 1979 film isn't so much the plot, it's more the way the story is presented that I loved.The plot is as basic a horror flick as you're gonna get, a Kodak moment-type family moves into a large house in the country despite the fact that another family was previously murdered there. Soon some odd events start happening, getting more and more sinister each day. Anyone could come up with that story, it would be easier than anything. But the film presents the horrific events in ways so intense that it makes this movie stand out above the others in its genre. For example, when one of the kids has a window slam shut on his fingers. It's graphic, sad and incredibly disturbing, the poor boy screams in terror as blood oozes out from his trapped fingers and his parents frantically scream for help. On the version of the film I bought, the sounds of people screaming are enhanced to be louder than the rest of the film, making for many jump scares. The soundtrack is haunting, eerie and beautiful and the 1970's atmosphere makes me want to do up my hair in a feathered hairstyle, grab a super 8 camera and a ticket stub to Star Wars, some disco vinyl records and go back in time to when days were better! This movie has certainly been replicated, remade and butchered far too many times (The Conjuring is the rip-off that stands out the most), but this version is a true cult classic and a campfire-style horror story that will probably keep affecting viewers for generations to come. I also recommend watching Sinister (2012), Pet Sematary (1989), The Shining (1980) and The Messengers (2007) if you're looking for similar movies.