It’s more than a year since I promised in passing that I would, at long last, be wrapping up the original Amityville series by reviewing the final entry in the franchise. So what took so long? Simple: after making that promise, I sat down and watched the damn thing.
An uncomfortably blended family moves into a house built by on the remains of a property that burnt down under mysterious circumstances. In the shed at the back of the property, the father finds an elaborate dollhouse, which he gives to his young daughter. But as soon as the dollhouse enters the home, the family begins to be assailed by strange and possibly deadly forces…
Having even less to do with the early films than its immediate predecessors – which is saying something – this final entry in the Amityville series almost made me glad to see the back of the entire franchise.
.
Almost.
I do love that house…
.
(And also at long last, I have reformatted The Amityville Curse (1990) and added some screenshots – such as they are; it’s not exactly the most visually arresting film.)
#1 by Ed on January 23, 2011 - 11:35 am
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Congrats on finishing the series. Could Howling 6 and 7 be waiting in the wings by any chance?
#2 by MatthewF on January 23, 2011 - 12:09 pm
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This film is an in-joke in my house for everything that is lazy, stupid and half-arsed about horror sequels when they get to movie XXVVVII and all the original impetus has departed and the franchise is now owned by a man with a video camera and a few untalented friends.
The giant mouse tail is awesome though.
#3 by lyzard on January 23, 2011 - 4:10 pm
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I complained that one of the other sequels was “just a bunch of stuff that happened”, but this one is exponentially worse.
Still like it better than the re-make of the original, though.
Ed, yes, there is every chance of it…groan. I do want to wrap up that particular franchise as well, but knowing Part 7 is out there waiting for me is not exactly encouraging me to head down that road.
Of course, I can always stall things by revising Part 1 and reformatting Parts 2 and 3. Been a while since I saw ol’ Chris in his shades…
#4 by Ed on January 23, 2011 - 4:26 pm
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I did a nice long piece on part 2 a few months ago for The Agony Booth, it’s just as hilariously awful as ever.
The fact that you liked this one better than the remake doesn’t surprise me. Anything from Platinum Dunes just ends up being flat at best and at worst, the Nightmare on Elm Street remake.
#5 by lyzard on January 23, 2011 - 4:32 pm
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Yes, I read your piece. And yes, it made me want to watch the damn thing again. Curse you! 🙂
I may be alone in the world with my sick fondness for Part 3, though. But, hey – mutant marsupials!
#6 by Clown Hammer on January 24, 2011 - 10:54 am
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I doubt you’re alone. I mean, furries probably love it.
#7 by Elizabeth the Ferret on January 25, 2011 - 12:25 am
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I have to say that part 3 is my absolute favorite. Marsupials are awesome. Even the word is awesome as it rolls off the tongue.
#8 by lyzard on January 25, 2011 - 2:10 am
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Ah, but they blew their big chance! Instead of going back to the novel, the fourth film should have been about monotreme werewolves.
#9 by supersonic on January 25, 2011 - 2:18 am
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After that, I want to see were-gorgonopsids.
#10 by Ed on January 23, 2011 - 7:47 pm
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Glad you enjoyed it. As for part 3, you’re not alone, I like it as well. Grabbed the DVD a few years ago super cheap. Weird, weird movie.
#11 by Mr. Rational on January 23, 2011 - 8:29 pm
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“…when they get to movie XXVVVII…”
I love this screwed-up Roman numeral. It makes me want to dash off a crappy screenplay just so’s I can use it. “Slasher Movie XXVVVII: Roman HoliFray.”
And the sad thing? Somebody would probably buy it.
#12 by El Santo on January 23, 2011 - 10:07 pm
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Lyz– I, too, really enjoyed Howling III: The Marsupials. Mind you, I haven’t seen it since it first hit the video store shelves here in the States, and much of my appreciation might have been attributable in retrospect to the mere fact that it wasn’t Howling II. Nevertheless, I found the sheer weirdness of the thing very compelling, in much the same way (if not to the same extent) as I found Razorback‘s weirdness compelling twelve years or so later.
#13 by lyzard on January 23, 2011 - 10:13 pm
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Heh! Yeah, I originally watched 2 and 3 back-to-back and had pretty much the same reaction; although I’ve grown fonder of 2 over the years, not through any intrinsic worth, but because of re-reading Keith’s review at regular intervals.
But Part 3 is one of those films where you just haven’t seen anything else quite like it. And while that causes most people to cry, “Thank God!”, for sheer WTF-ness alone it has a place in my heart.
#14 by Read MacGuirtose on January 23, 2011 - 11:02 pm
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Uh… okay, here’s an odd connection about this movie. The actor who played Jimmy… is currently my roommate. I have to admit it was a little surreal to check one of my favorite movie review sites and see a fifteen-year-old photo of someone who I can hear downstairs playing Halo even as I read the review…
[Edited to add: pointy brackets, not square ones]
#15 by Read MacGuirtose on January 23, 2011 - 11:03 pm
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(And once again I inexcusably forget that comments on this site use regular HTML code, not BBCode… you’d think I’d have got the hang of that by now.)
#16 by lyzard on January 23, 2011 - 11:06 pm
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Okay, that is just TOO weird for words!! Do tell me whether the memories are pleasant or unpleasant…and how he really feels about tarantulas. 🙂
#17 by Read MacGuirtose on January 23, 2011 - 11:14 pm
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Didn’t ask him about tarantulas, but I did just mention the review to him. He was still engrossed in Halo, so he didn’t say too much about the matter, but he didn’t seem offended or surprised by an unfavorable review, or inclined to try to argue the movie’s quality, so I don’t gather he thinks especially highly of this particular oeuvre either.
The closest thing he gave to a (tongue-in-cheek) defense of the movie was “It’s a work of art… depending on your definition of art.”
#18 by lyzard on January 23, 2011 - 11:18 pm
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{Monty Burns] “I don’t know much about art, but I know what I hate.” [/Monty Burns]
#19 by DamonD on January 24, 2011 - 4:50 am
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Many thanks for this, it’s the real definition of ‘taking one for the team’.
I have enough interest in bad movie sequels like this to want to know what happens…something about seeing “So-and-so Part 9” draws me in, makes me curious.
You want to see if it’s a forgotten little flawed gem in a faded dog-end of a franchise, or more likely something godawful that almost no-one cared about and was churned out to make a tiny buck or two. In part, too, for the (particularly with horror sequels) increasingly outlandish ideas and desperate attempts to preserve a thin thread of continuity.
While on the other hand, and particularly with just plain boring sequels, not really wanting to actually sit through them myself if I can avoid it.
So thanks again. “Seems reasonable” was beautifully deadpan too.
#20 by MatthewF on January 24, 2011 - 8:13 am
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I worry that in fact there are so many people buying/renting these movies out of morbid curiosity to justify making them. What if so many people check out Hellraiser 12:Hell Poodle “just to see how bad it is” that they make number 13? And so on? What if it never ends?
#21 by Clown Hammer on January 24, 2011 - 3:06 pm
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If they actually make Hell Poodle, I hope it never does end.
#22 by Ed on January 24, 2011 - 10:12 am
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For the Howling movies, it apparently doesn’t end since an eighth film is in the works.
#23 by El Santo on January 24, 2011 - 10:50 am
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“People keep asking us why we’re going back to a franchise that fell silent sixteen years ago– they want to know, wasn’t the premise already bled white by the seven movies we already made? Well, yeah. Of course it was. The thing is, though, we started thinking about it, and we realized that we hadn’t got all the lymph out of it yet.”
#24 by Ed on January 24, 2011 - 11:37 am
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I think the premise was dry after the third movie to be honest, there really isn’t much you can do after marsupial werewolves who fight for equality and end up making low budget horror movies.
I think the sequels that followed bear this out quite nicely.
#25 by Mr. Rational on January 24, 2011 - 11:46 am
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Great. And now, thanks to that description, I have to budget time for at LEAST the second and third Howling movies.
#26 by MatthewF on January 24, 2011 - 1:07 pm
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Having watched all 12 FRiday 13th movies last year, in order, including the remake. I can testify that indeed quality, ideas, reason, excitement, appetite, interest, novelty – none of these things are requirements for keeping a series going on.
#27 by The Rev. on January 24, 2011 - 1:20 pm
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Ohboyohboyohboy
I’ve been waiting for this, as it’s the only franchise sequel along with the howlingly goofy It’s About Time I’ve seen. I can’t wait to go read your reaction; I’m so excited I don’t think I can even finish th
#28 by Jen S on January 24, 2011 - 1:43 pm
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I like to think the mouse and tarantula ran away together, and now their freinds constantly pester them to tell their “how we met” story at dinner parties.
#29 by KeithA on January 24, 2011 - 2:10 pm
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I wish that, instead of every lame new Howling movie claiming to “get back to the spirit of the original,” someone would make a Howling movie that gets back tot he spirit of Howling II.
#30 by Ed on January 24, 2011 - 2:55 pm
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I agree, there’s a certain strange power in the badness of that movie. It’s hypnotic in a way.
#31 by El Santo on January 24, 2011 - 2:44 pm
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“I wish that, instead of every lame new Howling movie claiming to ‘get back to the spirit of the original’…”
Although, really, the problem with those is that what they got back to was the spirit of the mind-numbingly awful source novel instead.
#32 by lyzard on January 24, 2011 - 3:29 pm
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Good lord, the conversation! I’ll have to take on crappy pointless blood-from-a-stone sequels more often.
And speaking of which—
Gary Brandner and John G. Jones have, between them, a mindboggling amount to answer for.
You’re right: when you’ve reached a cinematic pinnacle like that, where else is there to go?
#33 by The Rev. on January 24, 2011 - 6:23 pm
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Well, finally I can comment. I appear to be almost as anal as Ms. Kingsley, in that I had to go and reread all the Amityville reviews prior before going on to the new one. (This also occurred with the Ft13 reviews.)
Yeah, that’s pretty much how I remember it: confusing and almost completely terrible. Except for the demon, which is awesome.
Fine work on the review.
I misspoke earlier: I also saw The Evil Escapes way back in the day. I haven’t seen it since, but still vividly remember a few parts of it.
#34 by lyzard on January 24, 2011 - 6:30 pm
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You WISH.
Lemme guess: the lamp, the fate of Fred the rosella, the ending, and Aron Eisenberg’s haircut.
#35 by The Rev. on January 25, 2011 - 12:56 pm
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I hope I get these tags right…
You WISH.
I do? I learn something new every day!
Lemme guess: the lamp, the fate of Fred the rosella, the ending, and Aron Eisenberg’s haircut.
Yes, no, yes, no. (I’m surprised I didn’t remember the second one all along.) Along with the lamp (and its flies) and the ending (from the lamp getting picked up and tossed out the window to the very end), I remember the strangulation with the cord, the garbage disposal scene, and the plumber drowning in muck (the last two freaked me out pretty good, even though I didn’t remember the hand).
#36 by The Rev. on January 25, 2011 - 12:57 pm
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Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand I did not get the tags right. Who’s shocked?
#37 by Carl on January 24, 2011 - 7:41 pm
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OK, since Ken won’t let me proofread any more, you get this: the wasps were probably standing in files, not flies
And that’s not a gorgeous tarantula. It’s drab. Now, a Mexican red-legged tarantula can be quite beautiful.
#38 by lyzard on January 24, 2011 - 7:53 pm
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You’ll have to be more specific. That quote doesn’t ring a bell, and I can’t access my site at work. (“Forbidden: Cult/Occult”, believe it or not.)
A red-leg may be more gorgeous, but that one’s still gorgeous. (Is there a difference between a reg-leg and a red-knee, BTW?)
#39 by Carl on January 24, 2011 - 8:13 pm
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Lyz,
Two paragraphs after the picture captioned “Sometimes it’s the parents who need to be emancipated” you write, “… wasps basically stand in flies all through this, don’t ask me why …” Unless “stand in flies” is Aussie slang I am unfamiliar with, that seems wrong.
I’m not an arachnologist, I’m just a guy who used to work at a spider petting zoo when I was in college, lo these decades ago. Wait while I search … OK, the picture at uniprot.org of a red-knee tarantula looks like what my museum called a “red-legged” one, so I’m thinking our Natural Sciences guys just misnamed it.
#40 by lyzard on January 24, 2011 - 8:16 pm
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Ah! It should be “stand in FOR flies”, as in the evil insect du jour.
I think it’s just a regional name thing.
#41 by supersonic on January 24, 2011 - 9:50 pm
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I think if I saw a dangerous critter standing in a pile of flies, that would be pretty scary.
#42 by Carl on January 24, 2011 - 9:55 pm
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“Stand in for” is standard usage in the USA, too. I was just thinking of “in files” meaning “in rows”, as if the wasps were in military formation.
#43 by Chad on January 27, 2011 - 2:09 am
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I didn’t think Howling VI was all that bad, but I had (have?) a pretty big crush on the guy who played the heroic werewolf in Howling VI, so my judgment may be skewed.
#44 by lyzard on January 27, 2011 - 2:50 am
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I guess I’ll be giving you my opinion on the subject sometime in the next coughcoughmuttermutter weeks.
#45 by Ed on January 27, 2011 - 11:06 am
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VI wasn’t too bad, if nothing else it tried to actually have real characters.
#46 by lyzard on January 27, 2011 - 3:35 pm
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I have actually seen VI, although quite some time ago, and while a lot of reviews complain that it’s too slow, I remember rather enjoying the character development at the beginning.
Though of course, it lost about a squillion points with me for the cat bit.
#47 by craig york on January 27, 2011 - 11:17 am
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Normally, anything with miniatures in it will at least
make me take a look at it, but after studying the stills,
I don’t think there’s a ball joint anywhere in that dollhouse. Will have to nip over to AYCYAS! and re-read
the review for HOWLING IV, though. We watched it
recently ( part of a ‘Hell of Four’ CD from the local
Wal-mart, oddly paired with the SyFy channel film
KRAKEN: Tentacles of the Deep…and a couple of other films I forgets…)
#48 by lyzard on January 27, 2011 - 3:33 pm
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The dollhouse opens to the side, which you can’t tell from that still. I’d say about 90% of all effort expended on this film went into making that thing.
Okay, 80% – the other 20% on Red Demon Guy.
#49 by Read MacGuirtose on February 1, 2011 - 1:02 am
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Okay, the opportunity finally came up to ask my roommate (the one who played Jimmy in Amityville Dollhouse) about the shoot, at a time when he is not engrossed in Halo and is free to give longer answers.
He said he’d actually done enough horror movies earlier that he had no interest in doing another horror movie at that time. His agent convinced him to go to the audition, but he wasn’t interested in the part. Even when he got the callback, he intended to turn the part down, until his agent told him it was shooting about five miles from his home… between that and the money, he figured he may as well go for it after all. (Well, most of it was shot in a house about five miles from his home in Santa Clarita… apparently part of it was shot on the Power Rangers soundstage in Valencia, but that’s still relatively close.)
And he ended up really enjoying the shoot, if perhaps not the finished product. “A really crappy film but a ton of fun. It was a good crew.”
#50 by Read MacGuirtose on February 1, 2011 - 1:05 am
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As for the tarantula, though, that part he didn’t enjoy so much… he actually was arachnophobic (though he didn’t mention that to the producer until after the fact). Though he says the size of the tarantula actually helped. “In a way, by being bigger it was more like an animal than a spider. I’m not sure why that made a difference but it did.”
Something else that didn’t help: “The tarantula wrangler showed us its fangs right before the scene where it was climbing all over me. Oh, thank you. I did not know they had fangs. They are quite large and pointy.”
(Quotes are more or less verbatim, though in transcribing them I may have missed a word here and there.)
He has a copy of the film on DVD (of course… “crappy” or not, I’d imagine most actors, at least those who aren’t big names, have copies of most of the movies they’ve been in. I know I have copies of a few really bad movies I’ve been in, though they’re all obscure enough they’re never likely to get reviewed here or anywhere else). Perhaps someday I’ll take a look…