Amityville 2 : The Possession

Alternate titles : None

Tagline : "In 1976 a New York family fled this house with their lives. The previous owners weren't so lucky... This is there story"

Whilst the first Amityville film wasn't exactly the greatest of movies, it certainly made enough money at the box office for the filmmakers to decide a sequel was in order. So, they decided to follow it up with a fictionalised account of the real-life tragedy that befell the house's previous occupants.

The movie starts by showing us the Montelli family (based on the DeFoe family who lived there in real life), who are just moving into their new house. But of course, as soon as they move in the problems start. The family continually rows with each other, the father (Burt Young) starts beating on the younger children. The local priest, Father Adamski (James Olson), comes round to bless the property and blood suddenly appears on the bedroom floors and finally the teenage son, Sonny (Jack Magner) starts hearing voices telling him to kill the others.

Father Adamski believes that the house is possessed and asks permission to perform an exorcism, but of course his superiors don't believe him and refuse to let him do so. Meanwhile Sonny continues to hear voices and finally flips, grabbing one of his fathers rifles, then goes round the house shooting the rest of his family.

Sonny's defence lawyer and Father Adamski attempt to get him off the hook by proving he is possessed by demons and ask that he be released so the church can perform an exorcism. But, not surprisingly, the judge throws their case out of court. But when Sonny breaks custody and hides back at his parents house, Adamski tracks him down and manages to perform an exorcism on him, in an ending that is ripped straight off "The Exorcist".

Adapted for the screen by Tommy Lee Wallace, who also worked on the earlier Halloween movies, the story is very loosely based on the book "The Amityville Murders" by psychic medium Hans Holzer. But altering the real-life story and mixing in other supernatural elements, in an attempt to cash in on the success of "The Exorcist". Which not only takes a lot of liberties, but would no doubt be considered downright offensive towards to the real life victims of the Amityville murders in todays overly sensitive politically correct climate.

But all other criticisms aside, this is really just a badly made movie, so take my advice and AVOID THIS AWFUL FILM!!!!!!!

Overall Marks : 3/10.

Terrifying Trivia

• Author John G Jones had written a book entitled "The Amityville Horror Part 2", claiming to be a continuation of the true events that affected the Lutz's after they moved out of the Amityville house (later debunked as a work of fiction), which the real life Lutz family hoped the sequel would be based on. However, the film makers chose to base the film on Psychic medium Hanz Holzer's book "The Amityville Murders", instead, which centered around the DeFoe family murders and claimed the killer was possessed by a demon.
• Younger siblings Jan and Mark Montelli were portrayed by real life brother and sister Erika and Brent Katz.
• The film used the same location as the previous movie, on Tom's River New Jersey, as the real life location wasn't available.
• Burt Young is undoubtedly best known for his role as Paulie in the Rocky films.
• The explosion at the end of the film didn't go to plan and accidentally burned one side of the house.
• Set prior to the events of "The Amityville Horror", the film supposedly takes place in the early-mid 70s. However, in one scene, a character is listening to a Sony Walkman, which wasn't invented until the early 80s.
• The soundtrack by Lalo Schifrin was mostly comprised of music from the first film.
• Jack Magner, who played Sonny Montelli, only appeared in one other film. With a minor role in the 1984 adaptation of Stephen King's "Firestarter".
• A couple of scenes were trimmed from the film included a scene where Anthony (Burt Young) anally rapes his wife, which was cut, and a scene where elder son Sonny rapes his sister, which was shortened. These scenes were added to the script by the director, who wanted to shock audiences. But was forced to remove them from the finished film owing to the adverse negative reaction they got from test audiences.
• The UK theatrical version was cut by the BBFC, removing the graphic scene where Anthony (Burt Young) is shot by Sonny. Subsequent VHS releases and the original UK DVD also ommited this scene, though the uncut version was later released onto disc in 2008.

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