December 28 - The Amityville Horror (1979)

Today’s motion picture is a horror film with a scene that happens on December 28. Watch this film tonight.

        

THE AMITYVILLE HORROR   

In a house in Amityville, New York a family of six is murdered. A year later the Lutz family looks at the house and buys it. While they are cleaning their priest arrives to visit. Flies appear in the room he’s in and a voice tells him to “Get Out!”. When he tries to call the Lutzs to tell them about this the phone line is all static and the phone burns his hand.  The father, George Lutz feels cold in the house, their son falls downstairs and light bulbs explode. George starts waking up every morning at 3:15 a.m. (which he later learns is the time of the murders) and finds lights on and closed windows are now up.   Objects move themselves and black muck appears in the toilets. When a nun visits, she senses evil. Mrs. Lutz has a nightmare and on the way to see the Lutzes, the priest’s car malfunctions. When Mrs. Lutz’s brother gets married $1500 of his money disappears and a babysitter is trapped in a closet. Their priest’s superiors think he’s nuts to be suggesting a supernatural cause of these problems. On December 28, 1975 a couple visit the Lutzs and the wife, Carolyn feels fear. [58:14 to 1:03:22] A window tries to crush the son’s hand. George wakes up at 3:15 again and sees flies in the room. Windows and the front door are blown off their hinges. The police are called. Mrs. Lutz tries to call the priest, but only gets static. Mrs. Lutz has a vision of a man and then of eyes in the window. George goes to a bar and uncharacteristically for him almost gets in a fight. Their friend Carolyn says the house was built by a witch from Salem. She identifies a spot in the basement where their dog digs. They find a red room and have a vision of the killer. Carolyn gets possessed briefly. The Lutzes try blessing the house themselves. The priest is blinded and the Lutzes fight about the house. Mrs. Lutz reads about the murders. George is apparently possessed by the killer’s spirit and the walls start to bleed. They flee, but George goes back to save the dog. He almost drowns in a pool of muck that appears in the basement, but the dog saves him. They all leave.

I remember the buzz this film generated at the time.  However, it now seems kind of a yawner. The story seems kind of over the top and told with a “can you believe this’ kind of style. Actually, no I can’t but if you like horror films you might be interested in one of the first in the genre. 

The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson (Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1977) at page 5 gives the date they moved in as December 18, which is day one, so day 11 as given at 58:33 is December 28.

Awards- Lalo Schifrin's musical score was nominated for an Academy Award, but lost

Director - Stuart Rosenberg      

Runtime - 1 hour 57 minutes        

Released - July 27, 1979

Starring - James Brolin as George Lutz, Margot Kidder as Kathy Lutz, Rod Steiger as Father Delaney, Don Stroud as Father Bolen, Murray Hamilton as Father Ryan , Helen Shaver as Carolyn

Copyright by Ivan Walters in 2015.