Poltergeist

May 22, 20155 min

“Their here” Most of the time you hear those words when someone you have been waiting for arrives. In that instance it’s good, but you never want to hear those words as someone stares into a TV set, because well that can’t be good. In 1982 no one would forget Carol Anne as she muttered those famous words, and Steven Spielberg Tobe Hooper help inspired many a nightmares. Thirty two years later someone thought this film needed a reboot or remake, which sounds good on paper, I mean all the other studios are doing it.

Asking what could go wrong are often famous last words, and in this case it becomes more what did they do right? Eric (Sam Rockwell) and his wife Amy (Rosemarie DeWitt) have had to move their family, and they think they have found the perfect house for their budget. Their oldest Kendra (Saxon Sharbino) is your typical un-happy teenager, and especially dislikes the move. Then there is Griffin (Kyle Catlett) who seems to fear everything, especially after losing his younger sister Madison (Kennedi Clemets) in a mall once. Together they are the Bowens, and they made the wrong choice with their house. Their neighborhood you see is built over an old cemetery that may or may not have been completely moved. When Madison, goes missing, it doesn’t take long to realize she was taken by something not alive anymore, and who is very angry at something. The Bowen’s call in some help as they try and get Madison to stay out of the light and to come back to them.

I want to start off by saying, after watching this movie; I would have chosen the light, if it spared me having to sit through this movie again. Gone are the charm and the heart of the original film, as well as the scares. Instead they are replaced with bad CGI and nothing that will make you want to sleep with the lights on. Writer David Linday-Abaire (Rise of the Guardians) takes a good story and finds a way to take everything that made it good and just gives you what’s left. The writing though is just part of the problem, add acting that isn’t up to par, all except Rockwell, who must have known what kind of movie he was in and just decided to have fun with it. When you remake something that so many people enjoy, there is going to be a lot of comparisons. When New Coke came out back in the day, all everyone said was, “ I want my old coke back, no one asked for this change”. That is exactly my thoughts on “Poltergeist”, no one asked for this remake, but yet here it is anyway. I wanted to like this movie, because the original one holds such a special place in my movie heart. Instead I felt like the filmmakers of this version just wanted to make a cheap film, so they can see how much money they could rake in. So stay home this week and watch the original “Poltergeist”, because the new one will only scare the money out of your pocket and leave you disappointed.

Brian Taylor

 




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