"The Amityville Horror" (2005)

Starring Ryan Reynolds, Melissa George
Directed by Andrew Douglas

"The Amityville Horror" manages to do two things that most remakes have a hard time doing, be scary and improve on the original.

The story is based on the alleged true events of one of the most infamous haunted houses in paranormal history, as chronicled in the bestselling book by Jay Anson. In 1974, Ronald DeFeo, Jr. killed his parents and four siblings because he heard voices in the house telling him to do it. The next year, George (Ryan Reynolds, "Van Wilder") and Kathy (Melissa George, "Alias") Lutz move into the house with Kathy's three kids, and as soon as they move in weird things start happening.

For those not familiar with the original movie, consider yourselves lucky. There are significant changes between this telling of events and the 1979 film. For example, the original wasn't scary. It's hinted at throughout that there's something going on, but you don't see anything significant to come to this conclusion. In this remake, you see the ghosts of the house, and they are scary. The prosthetic makeup was done by Jake Garber (Benecio Del Toro's makeup artist on "Sin City"), and he does an excellent job of making these ghosts look gross and creepy.

In the original, a big deal was made about the fact that George (played by James Brolin in the original) was looking more and more like Ronald DeFeo before they decided to leave the house. In the remake, the resemblance was hinted at, but nothing is done to highlight it.

Also, in both versions the youngest daughter sees someone she calls Jody in the house. In the original, we never see Jody, although the story goes that Jody was a pig that talked to the daughter. In the remake, Jody is the ghost of one of the DeFeo children, and we see her quite a bit. Being able to see what the youngest daughter sees makes the story all that much better.

The acting in this version is definitely better than it was in the original film. Melissa George does a great job of playing Kathy, and really makes you believe that she is scared for her children when George starts becoming more sadistic. Reynolds is a surprise, going against the type of the usual goofy characters he plays in movies. He's intense in this film, and it's quite believable that he would go off the deep end after being in that house all the time. For the first time in his career, Reynolds is creepy with a purpose.

Another big surprise is the three kids in this film, played by Jesse James ("The Butterfly Effect"), Jimmy Bennett ("Hostage") and Chloe Moretz ("Heart of the Beholder"). The producers managed to get decent kid actors that most productions think of as window dressing. The kids here have significant roles in the film, and instead of acting like your typical "cute kids in peril," actually look frightened by the goings on in the house.

Michael Bay, who produced this film, also produced "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" remake. Although for the "Chainsaw" remake he stuck with the idea of keeping the kills off-screen like the original did, in this version they revamped the entire story to make it scarier than its predecessor, and it works.

Director Andrew Douglas, whose only other credit is a documentary called "Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus," proves that he can go beyond the documentary format and move into fiction, and does it very well with this film. The visual look of the remake is dark and creepy throughout, and through the cinematography you sense that something isn't quite right with this house. Even exterior shots of the house make it look scary.

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