First off: I’m doing a bad job keeping the writing of these reviews to 10-ish minutes.
Second off: behold tiny geisha Elvis!
Third off: POLTERGEIST is not a good movie.
And I think the reason why mostly has to do with poor storytelling tactics from the writers (Steven Spielberg, Michael Grais, Mark Victor) and the director (Tobe Hooper).
We start off with the “normal family in suburbia” sequence. Then we have the “poltergeist-y moving chairs and bending silverware” sequence.
So there’s a natural build there. The next sequence?
How about a “tree monster appears in a storm and tries to eat one child while another one is sucked into a different dimension” sequence.
…and the wheels fall off.
Because after rocketing from “normal family” to “tree monster” the movie slams to a halt with the “parapsychologist investigators do some investigating” sequence that turns into an expositional quagmire including a loooooong boring dialogue scene that’s delivered in whispers.
Then some more poltergeist-y stuff.
Then another expositional quagmire starring the tiny geisha Elvis pictured above doing some monologuing.
Then a seeming climax with wormholes and demon/beasts and strawberry gelatin and a rope. Victory!
Then, puzzlingly, we have another “normal family in suburbia” sequence where the family, after nearly losing two of their children to horrifying supernatural events, stops moving out of their cursed house so they can GO ABOUT THEIR NORMAL ROUTINE FOR NO REASON. This includes the mother taking a long luxurious bath and trying to dye her hair. The children are sleeping in a bedroom that, the previous day, CONTAINED A WORMHOLE FULL OF DIMENSION-SPANNING DEMONS THAT ABDUCTED ONE OF THE CHILDREN.
The above sequence exists solely so movie can then attempt a second climax (in other instances perhaps a positive thing). This, at least, prevents the mother from spending 2-3 hours filing her nails and taking up some new hobbies while her children sleep in a cursed house that has actively been trying to kill them.
Things happen. The family escapes.
The house implodes into a different dimension and it’s revealed that a greedy real estate developer is the actual villain of the story (perhaps the most resonant message you get watching this film in 2016). The family finally has to move. Perhaps not because they want to, but because there is no more cursed house for them to voluntarily stay in anymore.
Let’s avoid discussion of plausibility, though, and focus on the crappy structure of the film.
As mentioned, after a promising start, POLTERGEIST immediately redlines with the supernatural shit hitting the supernatural fan: tree monster, inter-dimensional vortex, abducted daughter. Then, in order to navigate this red-lined shit-hitting supernatural state of affairs, the writers create a sequence and set of characters (parapsychologist investigators) that exist entirely for exposition purposes. Later on they create another sequence with another character (tiny geisha Elvis) that exists for the same expositional purpose.
A large chunk of this movie consists of duplicate expositional sequences–and that’s inherently poor storytelling. Having a character enter the story to just to explain things is lame. Sometimes unavoidable but always lame. More than illuminating the old “show don’t tell” saw, this approach robs the audience of the experience of working through and exploring this unreal situation with a character. Preferably the protagonist.
But worse yet, there is no real protagonist in the film. There is no one actively driving the plot forward. The family is befuddled throughout the movie. When they need help, an outside character enters and fills them in. When that doesn’t work, ANOTHER OUTSIDE CHARACTER enters and fills them in. They seem to overcome their supernatural enemies, but it turns out that the second outside character was wrong too! Then, somehow, the house eats itself and the movie ends. The parent characters may do some yelling and rescuing here and there, but they’re reacting to the situation at hand, not actively moving the plot forward.
So instead of creating this red-lined supernatural shitstorm and letting the audience follow a protagonist as he/she/it presses forward to a resolution, the movie goes like:
Normal world.
Shitstorm.
Exposition.
Exposition.
Fake ending.
Ending.
The “poltergeist” type of ghost was, in 1982, mostly unknown horror territory in the movies. And some of the supernatural sequences in POLTERGEIST are conceptually intriguing. But without a true protagonist or sound plot structure, the movie doesn’t cohere into anything solid. It takes more than an iconic movie poster and three interesting ideas to make a good movie.
Come for allure of seeing an overrated horror film, stay for the challenge of figuring out why the filmmakers prominently feature the family’s Golden Retriever in some scenes then totally disregard its existence in others.
FADE OUT 