Review of Poltergeist (2015) by Quinn S — 06 Dec 2015

Review:

What a terrible remake! It's definitely not in the same class as the original and I'm surprised that it made a profit at the box office. I'm usually a big fan of Sam Rockwell but his performance was pretty poor. Anyway, if you've seen the first movie, the concept is, more or less, the same. A family move into a new suburban home and the two younger kids, Madison (Kennedi Clements) and Griffin (Kyle Catlett), start to see some strange things happening around the house. There parents Eric (Sam Rockwell) and Amy (Rosemarie DeWitt), take no notice of there young son, because he has a history of seeing abnormal things. When they go out for a meal with there new friends, the Poltergeist starts to take over the house and it takes Maddy into its paranormal world. When Eric and Amy come home from there night out, they soon realise that some strange things have been happening in there house and when they realise that Maddy is missing, they hire a paranormal research team to investigate her disappearance. With the help of there elder daughter, Kendra (Saxon Sharbino), they set up some gadgets around the house to try and work out were Maddy has gone. The head of the research team Dr. Brooke Powell (Jane Adams), soon realises that she is going to need a specialist to go into the paranormal world, so she calls on her ex-husband, Carrigan (Jared Harris), to tackle the ghost. When he arrives, he soon gets spooked with the scale of the case but he uses his expert skills to get Maddy back into the normal world. The reason why I thought this movie was so bad was because none of the family looked that surprised about there house being taken over by a unknown powerful force. When there daughter gets taken, no one seemed to panic and with all of the noise going on in the house, no one was suspicious in there neighbourhood, especially when there car crashed through there garage or when the kid was shouting in the tree. The police were never called through the whole, noisy, episode and the idiot that nearly got a drill through his head, decided not to tell anyone, for some unknown reason. On the plus side, I did stick with the movie because I was wondering how they were going to get Maddy back but that also turned out to be very disappointing. The acting was poor from the whole cast, because they wasn't screaming or showing any intensity through the whole film but the graphics were OK. I wasn't that disappointed because a lot of my friends told me that it was rubbish, and now that I've watched it, I can understand why true Poltergeist fanatics were upset with this remake. If they decide to come out with a Poltergeist 2, which they might because this movie made a profit, they really need another script writer because there were to many holes in this storyline. Disappointing!

Round-Up:

A lot of people remember the first movie because of the little girl, Carol, and the weird psychic Tangina and the acting from the whole cast, especially the mother and father, played by Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams, was brilliant. There's nothing that memorable in this movie and I wasn't left wanting to see a part 2. Anyway, a lot of people class Poltergeist as a Steven Spielberg classic but he actually didn't direct the movie. Spielberg did write the original story but it was directed by Tobe Hooper, who brought you the Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise in 1974. This remake was directed by, London born, Gil Kenan, 39, who brought you City of Ember and the animation movie, Monster House. With only 2 movies to his name, I don't think that he was the perfect candidate to take on this all time classic and I don't think that he got the best out of Sam Rockwell and Rosemarie DeWitt. There wasn't enough emotion from the characters, which I'll blame on the director because they are both known for there great performances. I think that it was the fact that this was called Poltergeist, why it made a profit at the box office and not because it was a good film. I just hope they give the next project to another director, if they make one.

Budget: $35million.

Worldwide Gross: $95.5million.

I recommend this movie to people who are into their horror/thrillers starring Sam Rockwell, Rosemarie DeWitt, Jared Harris and Jane Adams. 2/10.