Poltergeist (1982) review

"This house is clean." Spoiler alert: it's not!

Welcome to "Cuesta Verde" where we see a family living the American dream in 1982 - a new house in a suburban, cookie-cutter, Mayberry-esque California neighborhood. I like how the housing tract has a bullshit Spanish name like you find all over southern California. What I like is how during these idyllic scenes there are many foreshadowings: a blank, static television set communicates with the youngest daughter Carol Anne, a pet bird is buried in the back yard only to be dug about by the dog, spoons bend, glass shatters, chairs stack themselves on top of a table and the kitchen floor is able to push things with unseen momentum. It's a bit like "The Exorcist" where the weird and normal are mixed and then shit gets real after Carol Anne announces her now famous line, "they're here". The parents get distracted with a tree trying to eat their son and Carol Anne is abducted by some entity after being sucked into the closet.

The second act involves a group of parapsychologists that come and investigate. Some of these scenes are slower paced. One of them is scared off when the entity causes him to hallucinate that maggots are crawling out of his face. The special effects are dated but this scene is scary, especially when I first saw the film as a 7 year old. There's a great scene where the father, played very well by Craig T. Nelson, is shown a plot of land on a hill overlooking his housing development in the valley with his sleazy, unscrupulous boss.

The camera shows the two men walking alongside a picket fence discussing profits and future development. Then the camera shows that there's an old cemetery on the other side of the fence. The boss tells Mr. Freeling that "besides, we've done it before...in 1976...right down there", referring to how his housing tract used to be a cemetery as well and the bodies were moved. The audience begins to wonder, along with Mr. Freeling, if the family's house has dead bodies underneath it. This unexpected denouement is foreboding and for me it summarizes the real crux of the film - greed. Good horror films, to me, are the ones that convey some kind of message other than just death and scares. "The Exorcist" is really a film about faith and "The Shining" deals with child and spousal abuse.

The film really picks up speed when Tangina, played virtuosically by Zelda Rubinstein, appears. She gives a mesmerizing monologue about death, the spirits haunting the house and "the beast" that is lying and detaining Carol Anne. Tangina is not in much of the film but to me she steals the show. There's another brilliant moment where Tangina is possessed by "the beast" and starts telling Carol Anne in a very chilling voice to "walk into the light". They get her back and for a moment it seems like all is well.

The last act is when the entity tries to get Carol Anne back. There's the famous scene of the angry clown doll strangling the young son and a great scene where Mrs. Freeling is clawing her way out of a muddy, skeleton laden excavation in the backyard where a swimming pool is in the process of being created. Fun fact: the skeletons used were real and Jobeth Williams didn't find that out until afterwards. The family runs out of the house with coffins shooting up of the ground and there's another great scene where Mr. Freeling confronts his boss and is screaming at him, "You only moved the headstones!" They drive off to a motel and remove the television set, which is darkly funny.

A good film requires: a good story, pacing, production values and good memorable moments. A great film has those components and the added element of standing the test of time. "Poltergeist", for me, has all those. Interestingly (and rare) for a horror film, no one dies. The only death is the pet bird in the beginning.