Poltergeist (2015)

Review

"They're here …" - Madison Bowen

The Bowen clan, husband and wife Eric and Amy along with their three children in descending age Kendra, Griffin, and Madison are forced to move into an estate home due to Eric losing his job. Almost immediately Griffin is uncomfortable in the house, but since he's pretty timid at the best of times Eric and Amy pay him no mind. It's not like he's joining Madison in talking to the invisible people in Madison's closet, which remains resolutely jammed. Eric it would appear isn't high on the home handyman thing, or checking his house for potential dangers. For her part Kendra is throwing the typical teen chick spate and is at times openly rebellious, you go girl!

Things start to take a sinister turn when Madison discovers the people in the closet are arriving via the television with dark intent on their minds. Eventually Madison disappears into her closet, which is a gateway to the other side, and the remaining Bowens are forced to face their darkest fears in trying to get her back. Who you going to call, Doc Brooke Powell and her team from the local University Para-psychology department, and television spook buster Carrigan Burke. Hey you buy a house at the right price built over an old cemetery, don't be surprised if it goes Amityville on your arse.

Okay first up Poltergeist (2015) is clearly a remake of the Tobe Hooper/Steven Speilberg classic 1982 fright flick and about everyone is jumping the bandwagon of hating due to that fact. However if taken as a standalone outing without the looming presence of its ancestor the 2015 movie isn't without merit for those prepared to get down and munch their popcorn. There were a number of missed opportunities, the homage being paid via core scenes felt a bit flat, and the Bowen family failed to garner the same depth of audience feeling the Freeling tribe did previously but there were positives. To be honest I have never put Poltergeist (1982) on the same pedestal a lot of folk have, the Speilberg name is apparently worth some traction in certain sections of the movie watching community, as the original came with a lot of issues of its own, number one being Speilberg's apparent propensity to interfere and tone down the movie Hooper might have cranked out for us. So yeah for once I thought a remake was more than justified, and to be fair that lack of wailing over the remake status to me would indicate not that people are all over complaining, but move over a lot of punters were happy for another attempt at the same burial ground, this time with more sauce added to the mixture. Let's catch the spooks 2015 style.

There are numerous scenes in the movie that are directly paying homage to the original movie as director Gil Kenan demonstrated he isn't above taking things down a whole new path, paying only lip service to the original flick. On the bright side of the television screen at least we are getting an honest remake rather than the name only cannon fodder being pushed on younger teens. If you have seen the original movie you'll groove to re-enactments of a lot of the classic scenes, but for mine Director Kenan is at least giving them a new look and feel.

When Poltergeist rolls you are immediately put into haunted house territory, which is reinforced later in the movie prior to the supernatural rocking. Family buy affordable house in housing estate that is starting to show some wear and tear. As Amityville pointed out, cheap houses generally in the horror genre come with some unwanted tenants. We learn soon after that said housing estate is built over an older cemetery, bodies supposedly disinterred and moved elsewhere, except gasp they weren't, just the headstones were moved. In a wink to the original movies a minor character even notes that at least the estate isn't built over an old Native American burial ground. So the groundwork is laid, and heck I'm almost getting convinced that this movie might actually be better than we were lead to expect by the bandwagon of haters rolling down Main Street.

Through the course of the movie we have a number of scenes that build on what happened in the original movie, but unfortunately they fail to add anything really cool to the pot. We get the spooks initially doing some fun stuff, but nowhere near the sliding coolness of the original kitchen. What else, oh the tree outside, that really serves as a distraction and not the harbinger of "a storm's coming" we really wanted to rock out too in a big way. Naturally the clown doll makes the scene, but it's such a thugly thing that you wonder what sort of deranged parent would have ever given this grotesqueness to their kids, I'm thinking definitely Child Services required there. And of course we get the infamous "they're here" scene, once again via a television screen, and even though that screen is a modern flat monstrosity one is left wondering why the medium of contact hasn't been upgraded to a tablet or something. At least Director Kenan isn't shying away from the fact that the movie is a remake. There's plenty of other scenes you'll recognise, sadly lacking for mine were the ghostly apparitions from the original, but if they aren't going to include the Speilberg family dog then I guess spectres aren't making the scene either.

Central to any haunted house yarn are the cast of characters that get down with ghostly happenings. In this regards the Bowen tribe certainly had me on board. Dad Eric was slightly cold and aloof, but the character didn't drop his persona throughout the movie, talk about your trying to be level headed and adult as the walls come crumbling down. I was digging Eric and hope I can emulate his head of house riff if Jody ever comes knocking. Mum Amy was all emotion, she did that chick thing as the slime hit the fan and kept on the maternal roller coaster as things went pretty dark through the middle parts of the flick. The kids were a mixed bunch, elder daughter Kendra was more into telecommunications than the family thing, her biggest horror was her smart phone crapping out, son Griffin was scared of his own shadow but come the time come the boy, and finally youngest daughter Madison was all sweetness and open eyed innocence. Must admit I was somewhat disappointed in our ghost busters this time round, come back Tangina, we're missing you babe!

About the best additional scenes to the previous movie were the replacement for the kitchen stack of chairs, you'll know it when you see it, and one gnarly squirrel scene that will have you jumping in your seat then laughing your arse off. Good times as Ridgemont High kids. Unfortunately the rest of the scare factor evolves to simply some jump scares and a bit of surrealism in the beyond. Not much to write home about to be perfectly honest.

I wandered into Poltergeist with the opinion that I was about to see a remake that wouldn't be that good, come on Ghost House Pictures don't really have a good record regardless of what the Raimi fanbois claim, Mary Jane cookie cutters comes to mind. What I got was a pretty entertaining light weight horror flick that really didn't cause me any harm, and which kept me entertained for its hour and a half running time. Will it be considered a classic in years to come, no I don't believe so but then again I don't consider the original a horror classic, Speilberg fanbois are distorting the reality there. So a movie that was better than expected, how often can you say that, but which was pretty run of the mill in terms of the dark genre. Recommended to folk who want a haunted house outing that they can take their kids to, you can wait on the disc release as there is talk of an extended cut on that medium. To be honest this noisy ghost was well behaved, where were the scares Gil Kenan?