Movie #548: Poltergeist

Poltergeist is a horror film starring Heather O'Rourke, Craig T. Nelson, JoBeth Williams, Beatrice Straight, Dominique Dunne, Oliver Robins, and Zelda Rubinstein. The part I always forget is that it was directed by Tobe Hooper, he of Texas Chainsaw Massacre fame, but produced and heavily influenced by Steven Spielberg.

The movie revolves around the Freeling family, who live in a recently built and continually expanding development. Steve (Nelson), the father, sells these houses and kicks ass at it. The kids, Dana (Dunne), Robbie (Robins), and Carol Anne (O'Rourke) are all pretty much living their 80s white kid best lives. And then the haunting starts.

Carol Anne identifies the "TV people" who talk to her when the TV is showing static (which dates this movie more than anything). It rapidly escalates from there; chairs move around in a predictable and constant way and the mother, Diane (Williams) is initially convinced that there's nothing harmful about this, just spooky. And then the massive tree outside Robbie's window comes to life and tries to eat him, the closet door blows open and sucks Carol Anne into another dimension, and the family calls in help from SAVE the local university in the personage of Dr. Lesh (Straight), and later of diminutive psychic Tangina (Rubinstein).

I had forgotten how much I like this movie, and not just because it's such a great Chill template. The family unit is functional. It doesn't get dragged down in family drama, but there's still some tension as Robbie gets sent away to grandma's (along with the family's long-suffering golden retriever, who, as always, is the real hero here). Steve and Diane are both loving and supportive parents, and the movie doesn't waste any time on anyone denying what's happening in front of them, which allows more time to let everyone be scared and out of their depth.

And oh, man, everyone is out of their depth. Tangina "cleans" the house, but doesn't really, because she doesn't understand what really happened (as Steve later realizes, when the real estate company cleared the cemetery that the development now rests on, they moved the headstones but not the bodies, and the unquiet dead are pissed). The result of this is a false ending to the movie, as the big crazy climax leads to another big crazy climax, but it somehow doesn't feel artificially extended.

The effects in the movie mostly still hold up; the "face melting hallucination" bit is probably what looks the most fake, but it's still good enough to make me think "holy shit, this movie is rated PG?" (and yes, I'm aware of why that is, but still).

All in all, it's a classic horror movie for a reason, and shares a special distinction with The Babadook in that there are no human fatalities.

My Grade: A
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

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