Poltergeist

I know I saw the original Poltergeist film, starring coach Craig T. Nelson, a bunch of times when I was a kid, and I'm not a kid now, so comparing my youthful impressions to those I currently prescribe isn't a viable option, but there was one scene from the original that still sticks out, near the end, when a hallway is featured and then its length hauntingly extends to augment the sense of desperation, there's nothing like that in the new film, nothing that memorable, although if I had been 8 while watching it I might have found it more shocking, more real.

I may have also found it not so shocking.

There seems to be a formula that's being followed here, which is adhered to too strictly, like they have i's to dot and t's to cross rather than innovations to disseminate and paradigms to shift.

They just seemed to spend more time building up tension in the original, it's patiently disorienting, which explains the switch from otherworldly supernatural investigator Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein) to rough and tumble Carrigan Burke (Jared Harris), the best feature of the film, due to his comic exchanges with glasses wearing ex-wife Dr. Brooke Powell (Jane Adams), and charismatic audacity, like he's running for 1,500 yards a season, which suggests that contemporary horror is more immediate than that dispensed in the 1980s, although I don't watch enough mass produced contemporary horror films to be able to make that claim with legitimate certainty.

It's a tough claim to make with legitimate certainty no matter how many horror films you watch.

That's what makes making such claims so much fun.

The other aspect of the film that I liked was its focus on the struggles of middle-class American families, represented by the Bowens, credit card debts without regret, no other choice, the poltergeists functioning like manufactured socioeconomic pressures, subconsciously harrowing burdensome manifestations.

They also wrapped up this Poltergeist film too quickly, which fits with what I'm saying, one of the strengths of the original being the shattered sense of calm explosively annihilated in the end.

Perhaps it was a warning that bourgeois economic prosperity was about to start facing tough times in America?

A precursor to the first Terminator film.

It probably wasn't that.

I like that the new Poltergeist film didn't duplicate the original's ending, but would have liked to have seen it replaced with something different.

They just abruptly end it.

Bivouacs.

Although it has some solid characters and themes, I remain loyal to the original.

The original sequels weren't that great though.

The new Poltergeist 2 could exponentially improve on The Other Side.