Review: The Amityville Murders

The story of the DeFeo family murders in a house later purchased by the Lutz family of hucksters who supposedly experienced some spooky stuff that inspired a book that was turned into the film “The Amityville Horror”. Diane Franklin and bullying Paul Ben-Victor are the volatile parents, John Robinson (looking completely different from his debut performance in “Elephant”) is their troubled son, whilst Burt Young and Lainie Kazan are the superfluous grandparents.

Although the Lutz family are shameless bullshit artists whom no one hopefully believes anymore (original author Jay Anson deserves some of the scorn too, admittedly), the 1979 film “The Amityville Horror” can at least claim to be a decent and iconic haunted/evil house movie. I’d go so far as to say that it’s a bit underrated, if entirely stupid. The house was scary as fuck, and the film worked OK for what it was. The sequels were almost entirely dreadful (I seem to recall the 3D one being tolerable at least), the remake not much chop either, and now here we have what is essentially a remake of “Amityville II: The Possession”. What that means is that it’s yet another prequel to the events in the original “Amityville Horror” film, focusing on the somewhat less bullshit story of the DeFeo family murders. I still think tagging anything with “Amityville” in the title with a ‘Based on true events’ label is disingenuous, but unlike the Lutz family bullshit, at least the DeFeo case does have some basis in fact, even if this series runs riot all over any of the facts with spooky haunted house/possession stuff more befitting what the Lutz family tried to sell.

The best thing I can say about this entirely tedious and completely unnecessary 2018 film is that it is slightly less awful than “Amityville II: The Possession”, and perhaps a little less focussed on the bullshit haunted house elements. It’s still a complete waste of time, the second such waste of time for actors Burt Young and the lovely Diane Franklin (frumpy and decidedly un-lovely here) who also appeared in “Amityville II: The Possession”, playing respectively the father and mother of the characters they played in the earlier film (although the names were fictionalised for the earlier film- still with me?). The stunt casting doesn’t pay off because the former is barely on screen and the latter isn’t cast to her best advantage. She seems to be trying to ape actress Lainie Kazan who plays her mother (but Kazan is really just doing her usual thing), but is really bad at it.

Lifelessly helmed by writer-director Daniel Farrands (a feature directorial debutant who wrote the troubled “Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers” and directed the fascinating documentary “Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy”), it’s entirely flat, flimsy, and repetitive. It’s perhaps marginally less idiotic than “Amityville II: The Possession”, but that’s hardly praise. The house is still the most evil-looking in cinematic history, but this is a complete waste of time, with only John Robinson (barely) standing out among the cast. Boring, cheap, and unconvincing, it plays like a neutered TV movie for the most part and is entirely un-terrifying. Don’t bother.

Rating: D+