More than a fixer-upper.

Over at Alex on Film I’ve been revisiting the Amityville Horror franchise, a series of terrible movies whose success is made all the more depressing by the fact that they were based on a tragic true story — by which I mean the DeFeo family murders, not the subsequent “haunting.”

The Amityville Horror (1979) is crap, but has some camp value today thanks mainly to James Brolin’s performance. Amityville II: The Possession (1982) is better made but is still crap, though it’s enlivened by a bizarre incest subplot. Amityville 3-D (1983) is in 3-D. The Amityville Horror (2005) is a fairly typical twenty-first century franchise reset. Casting Ryan Reynolds as George might have given things a boost, but it’s a gamble that doesn’t work. He just seems out of place.