Review of Poltergeist (2015) by Steven A — 25 Jul 2016

POLTERGEIST (15).

D: Gil Kenan.

20th Century Fox/MGM/Ghost House (Roy Lee, Robert G. Tapert & Sam Raimi).

US 2015.

93 mins (Uncut version: 101 mins).

Horror.

W: David Lindsay-Abaire [based on the 1982 screenplay by Steven Spielberg, Michael Grais & Mark Victor].

DP: Javier Aguirresarobe.

Ed: Jeff Betancourt & Bob Murawski.

Mus: Marc Streitenfeld.

Sam Rockwell, Rosemarie DeWitt, Jared Harris, Jane Adams.

My rule of thumb is that a film should only be remade if it's either an improvement on the original or another director feels that he can add his own artistic interpretation to the original source, anything else is purely for commercial reasons and generally lazy filmmaking. Poltergeist is lazy filmmaking.

The original wasn't quite perfect, but it has still dated reasonably well and still serves as a family-friendly horror movie with some atmospheric and chilling moments. The remake takes the scary scenes which built up tentatively in the original film and simply crams them into one plot device, updating the bare bones of the story with some 21st century tech and blatant product placement.

The characters here are so poorly written that they might as well not have names and their behaviour and interaction with each other doesn't come off as believable for a second.

The biggest loss is replacing Jerry Goldsmith's creepy music with a score which doesn't echo with foreboding dread. It's just bargain basement shit for the lowest common denomination of moviegoer.

Watch the original instead, it's far more rewarding.