Movie Review: The Amityville Horror (1979)

Genre: Supernatural Horror  

Director: Stuart Rosenberg  

Starring: James Brolin, Margot Kidder, Rod Steiger, Don Stroud, Murray Hamilton, Helen Shaver, Val Avery  

Running Time: 118 minutes  

Synopsis: Newlyweds George and Kathy Lutz (James Brolin and Margot Kidder) stretch the family finances and buy a dream Long Island house, priced at a discount because it was previously the scene of a murderous rampage. Father Delaney (Rod Steiger) arrives to bless the house but is chased away by an evil presence, while George becomes sullen and obsessed with wood chopping and axe sharpening. Other strange phenomena include a self-locking closet, the front door blowing off its hinges, the dog clawing at the base of a brick wall, and young daughter Amy developing an unhealthy attachment to an unseen entity she calls Jody. 

What Works Well: Initially believed to be based on actual events (the predecessor multiple murders did happen), this adaptation of the Jay Anson novel does develop a sense of dread. The theme of a family's financial stress threatening tranquility underpins the premise, while the more traditional bump-in-the-night scenes are capably staged by director Stuart Rosenberg, who finds the best angles to turn a house into a threat. James Brolin and Margot Kidder make for an appealing couple, and the rest of the cast features capable talent. 

What Does Not Work As Well: A lot seems to happen, but nothing of plot substance actually happens, exposing the underlying narrative weakness. Rod Steiger's priest fumbles around to no effect, Don Stroud and Murray Hamilton are two other priests with little to contribute, and Val Avery's frumpy detective does...what, exactly? Helen Shaver as a psychic family friend seems to have all the answers to questions that are never asked, and there is an awkward wedding sub-plot that never gels. Finally a muddle of theories encompassing Satanism and the gateway to Hell are trotted out in context-free desperation to create something out of nothing.

Key Quote:

The House (to Father Delaney): GET OUT! 

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Movie Review: Jaws 2 (1978)

A sequel that was always going to be inevitable, Jaws 2 nevertheless lacks any reason to exist other than cashing in on the success of the original.

On Amity Island, Sheriff Martin Brody (Roy Scheider) is still emotionally scarred by his previous experience battling a great white shark. The community under Mayor Larry Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) wants to move on, and Brody's wife Ellen (Lorraine Gary) has a job at the brand new Holiday Inn resort hotel. Brody's sense of unease is heightened when two scuba divers mysteriously disappear, and then an unexplained explosion destroys a small boat, killing two more people including a water skier.

Brody tries to convince the Mayor and the town council that another large shark may be feeding in the waters of Amity, but they ignore him. Brody's two boys also circumvent his pleas to stay out of the water, and they join other teenagers on a multi-boat sailing trip. The shark first attacks a group of student scuba divers and then turns its attention to the sailing boats, and Brody has to swing into action to try and save his kids and their friends.

With Steven Spielberg, Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw steering clear, only Roy Scheider returned for the first sequel, and then only because he had contractual obligations to fulfill. First John D. Hancock and then Jeannot Szwarc were brought in to direct, but the production was beset by infighting, a lame script, and more troubles with mechanical sharks.

Jaws had toyed with the audience before revealing the enormity of the monster, and added an existential men-against-nature layer of depth. With no new ideas to offer, Jaws 2 resorts to lining up interchangeable teenaged victims as food offerings to a clunky shark. The film is devoid of any elements of tension or drama, and already resorts to some wild contrivances of the shark-versus-helicopter variety.

Back on shore Brody battles the Mayor and other men in suits who refuse to believe another large shark is on the loose. Scheider and Hamilton lose the fight against a witless script boxing them into the same emotions for close to two hours.

The final 30 minutes finally build up a head of steam. Not that anyone can care about a group of barely defined teens being targeted by the shark, but at least the film defines a mission, Brody sets out to sea in another boat that may not be big enough, and Szwarc finds a gritty-enough final showdown. But thrash as it might, Jaws 2 is best remembered for the Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water... tagline, a near perfect example of a poster being much better than the film it promotes.

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Movie Review: Brubaker (1980)

A slow burning prison drama, Brubaker portrays a noble fight against a corrupt system but lacks the depth of character needed to sustain its weighty intentions.

In the late 1960s, a new group of prisoners arrives at the derelict Wakefield State Prison in Arkansas. Among them is a quiet man (Robert Redford) who says little and observes a lot. He witnesses crumbling infrastructure, inhumane conditions and a brutal system of prisoners designated as trustees regularly abusing inmates with whippings and torture. Meanwhile the warden and his administrators are either absent or uncaring. When he stumbles upon a detainee in solitary confinement (Morgan Freeman) threatening to start a riot, the quiet man reveals himself to be Henry Brubaker, the new reformist warden of the prison, appointed with the help of politician Lillian Gray (Jane Alexander).

The idealistic Brubaker takes over the running of the facility, sets about to improve living conditions and appoints a couple of the more dependable prisoners as trustees, including Dickie (Yaphet Kotto) and Bullen (David Keith). He uncovers a racketeering operation based out of the prison grounds, and corruption that extends well outside the prison walls: the surrounding community depends on the prison for slave labour and a steady stream of revenue from contracted projects that are shoddily delivered. By disrupting the long-established status quo Brubaker finds himself at odds with state prison board officials, including chairman John Deach (Murray Hamilton). Things get a lot worse when a long-term prisoner reveals an ever darker secret about what goes on at Wakefield.

Director Stuart Rosenberg returns to the prison milieu he helped to make famous with Cool Hand Luke, but this time it is the warden rather than a prisoner who shakes up the system. Written by W. D. Richter, Brubaker is loosely inspired by the real-life experiences of warden Thomas Murton and the 1967 Arkansas prison scandal. The film settles down to 132 minutes of oppressive drama where prison life is either bad or worse, the mood is grim and prospects bleak. Brubaker's progressive energy represents a thin ray of hope. But gradually he comes to realize that as difficult as it is to make changes within the prison walls, it's the fight against the broader community, benefitting from the prison as a source of slave labour and fraudulent contracts, that represents the greater challenge.

Within the prison the film is dominated by a large number of desperate men abandoned in dilapidating conditions, while the businessmen and politicians on the outside are determined to leave an existing economically advantageous arrangement alone. Rosenberg and Richter successfully build up a system seemingly too entrenched for one man to take on, and then let their hero loose to try and knock down a sturdy wall built on exploitation and abuse.

Cinematographer Bruno Nuytten colours the film in dark blues, greys and black, creating a bleak, grimy and frequently damp environment whether the action is inside the old buildings, on the expansive grounds, or within the depressed community. This is a film drenched in the pessimism of a broken system, and the tone rarely varies.

While mentally engaging, Brubaker rarely stirs the soul. The central character is too monotonal in his quest to do good, and little is offered in the way of character depth or evolution. Redford's performance starts and stops with a dogged determination, and does not change in the face of insurmountable odds.

The trustees and prisoners are plentiful, and that is a problem. Rosenberg is unable to carve out any individual identities beyond the most rudimentary sketches, and in the absence of characters with compelling depth, the film does drag. While David Keith as Larry Lee Bullen comes closest to finding a personality, Murray Hamilton and Jane Alexander have plenty of screen time but not many opportunities to step beyond their predictable character boxes. In addition to Morgan Freeman in his first credited role, stalwarts M. Emmet Walsh and Wilford Brimley have relatively minor appearances.

Brubaker has the right intentions and a worthwhile story, but lacks the spark needed to truly break out of the prison walls.

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The Movies Of Murray Hamilton

All movies starring Murray Hamilton and reviewed on the Ace Black Movie Blog are linked below:

The Spirit Of St. Louis (1957)

Anatomy Of A Murder (1959)

The Hustler (1961)

Seconds (1966)

The Graduate (1967)

The Boston Strangler (1968)

The Way We Were (1973)

Jaws (1975)

Jaws 2 (1978)

The Amityville Horror (1979)

1941 (1979)

Brubaker (1980)

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The Movie Star Index is here.

Movie Review: Jaws (1975)

A men-versus-shark thriller and the original modern high-budget, high-publicity summer blockbuster film, Jaws is a wild ride straight into the razor-sharp teeth of entertainment. Director Steven Spielberg's first massive hit is a gripping, suspense-filled battle between one small community and one mammoth killing machine.

At the New England summer resort town of Amity Island, a giant white shark starts a reign of terror. A skinny-dipping woman is the first to be killed, followed by the young Alex Kintner. Police Chief Brody (Roy Scheider), who has just moved to the community with his wife Ellen (Lorraine Gary) and young son, is afraid of the water and wants the beaches closed to safeguard the public from further attacks. But with the July 4th weekend fast approaching and the town's economic viability at stake, the town's Mayor Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) would hear none of it, especially when a large tiger shark is jubilantly caught and the threat hastily proclaimed to be over.

When the great white makes an audacious attack against Brody's young son and his friends in a supposedly sheltered  inner pool, Brody teams up with grizzled shark hunter Quint (Robert Shaw) and marine biologist Hooper (Richard Dreyfus), and they head out in Quint's boat to hunt down the predator on the open water. With tension mounting between the gruff Quint and the college-educated Hooper, they soon make contact with the seemingly indestructible and incredibly powerful shark, and the determined hunters become susceptible prey.

Drawing on eternal themes of man versus monster and the need to confront existential fears in order to survive, Jaws is a simple story of a large shark terrorizing a small community. But the movie adaptation of the Peter Benchley novel started shooting without a script, with an inexperienced director, and with a mechanical shark that rarely functioned. Over budget and way over schedule, producers Richard Zanuck and David Brown demonstrated remarkable faith in a 28-year-old Spielberg, and through talent and serendipity, he delivered a classic. Jaws went on to become the highest grossing film in history (until Star Wars came along).

The malfunctioning mechanical shark meant that Spielberg had to suggest the presence of the beast much more than show it. Jaws was therefore transformed from a horror film to a suspense thriller, the lethal predator lurking but unseen, its presence mostly suggested through point-of-view shots, and confirmed with the agony of churning water turning red with the gushing blood of mangled victims.

The imagination always creates the most powerful of visions, and the shark became the most menacing threat that every viewer could individually imagine. When the shark finally does appear it causes a jolt, never more so than the startling over-Brody's-shoulder shot, leading to the classic and prophetic "You're gonna need a bigger boat" line, ad-libbed by Scheider to Shaw.

The brilliantly minimalistic soundtrack by John Williams became as much a part of the film as the shark itself. Built on an astonishingly simple but incredibly sinister tuba two tone, the chilling music ignited Williams' career and started and long-lasting association with Spielberg.

Among the actors, Robert Shaw makes the strongest impression. Enjoying Quint as a larger than life and naturally abrasive hunter, Shaw lets loose with the dry laugh, the bad jokes, the long stories and the abuse directed mostly at Hooper. But he also gets the most deadly serious monologue in the film, recounting his background as a crew member of the USS Indianapolis, torpedoed by the Japanese at the end of World War Two with the survivors mercilessly attacked by sharks as they awaited rescue. It's a riveting island of quiet personal terror in the wide open seas of Jaws.

Roy Scheider plays Brody as a stoic man trying to do what is right, an outsider to the community objectively assessing the risks much to the consternation of the locals. He is finally forced to confront his fear of the water, although how a man with water phobia ever landed the position as Chief of Police at a seaside resort remains to be explained. Dreyfuss is slightly annoying as the academic shark expert Hooper, a know-it-all almost deserving of the abuse dished out by Quint.

Murray Hamilton brings delicious smarminess to Mayor Vaughn, and he gets the second best line of the movie when confronting the idea that the dead tiger shark may not be the killer terrorizing his community: "This is not the time or the place to perform some kind of half-assed autopsy on a fish. And I'm not going to stand here and see that thing cut open and have that little Kintner boy spill out all over the dock."

Jaws delivers extraordinary suspense in the water, an unforgettable story of evil lurking beneath the surface, a killing machine operating with beady-eyed efficiency.

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Movie Review: Anatomy Of A Murder (1959)

An absorbing courtroom drama, Anatomy Of A Murder bids a firm farewell to the 1950s and welcomes a new, much more liberal decade. With sometimes startlingly frank discussions about rape, semen, abuse, panties, and women's sexuality, and a probing of the link between psychiatric condition and criminal acts, Anatomy Of A Murder happily jumps from one taboo subject to another, ushering in a new era.

In small-town Upper Michigan, Paul Biegler (James Stewart) is a former District Attorney, now struggling to run his own home-based law practice. Paul's best friend is old-timer Parnell McCarthy (Arthur O'Connell), a former lawyer but now a confirmed drunk. Desperate for work, Paul accepts a seemingly hopeless case: to defend Lieutenant Frederick Manion (Ben Gazzara), who admits to shooting dead a pub-owner called Barney Quill, after Quill raped Manion's wife Laura (Lee Remick).

Laura is stunningly beautiful, dresses provocatively, and can't help flirting with every guy she meets, including Paul. But she insists that Quill did rape her, triggering an uncontrollable rage in Manion. Paul convinces Manion to plead not guilty due to temporary insanity, and sets off to find a medical expert to prove the point. Paul also uncovers the role played by Quill's bartender Alphonse Paquette (Murray Hamilton) on the night of the rape and murder, while McCarthy tracks down the background of the mysterious Mary Pilant (Kathryn Grant). When the trial starts, Paul is up against a shark of a prosecutor in the form of Claude Dancer (George C. Scott), who will do his best to prevent Paul from turning what should be a straightforward murder trial into a rape and revenge case.

The poster art and the angular, playful credit sequence announce the forthcoming change of decades. Anatomy Of A Murder also immediately deploys an enjoyable and innovative all-jazz soundtrack by Duke Ellington (who also makes a cameo), capturing the spirit of a movie tackling serious issues with a light touch. And the Wendell Mayes script wastes no time in going where few movies had gone before, delving into the vocabulary associated with rape cases and courageously portraying the victim as a liberated woman pro-actively seeking the attention of men.

Otto Preminger keeps Anatomy Of A Murder moving along a taut wire for its entire 160 minutes of running time. Cleverly injecting humour to break the tension, and giving equal time to the exploration of murder, rape, and a marriage punctured by jealousy, the film is rich with characters worth knowing and truths worth unveiling. The entire final third is dedicated to the court proceedings, and Preminger creates a dynamic and cavernous courtroom environment with a multitude of perspectives presided over by a caustic but reasonable judge. There are enough colourful events and personalities on show that Sam Leavitt's black and white cinematography is a simplifying relief.

Paul Biegler is one of James Stewart's final great roles. Stewart received his fifth and final Best Actor Academy Award nomination for bringing to life a lawyer who is smarter than he looks, more melancholy than he shows, charming and disarming when needed, and much more dogged than his foes give him credit for. Stewart sparring with the uncompromising George C. Scott in the epic courtroom battle is a duel for the ages.

Lee Remick is the other star of Anatomy Of A Murder. In just her fourth screen role, Remick sizzles as an over-sexed wife attracting the eye of every man she meets, and revelling in the attention. Dressed in pants, high heels and tight tops as she proves too hot to handle for rural upstate Michigan, Laura is a challenge for Paul both in fending off her lustful looks and insofar as her story of rape may have sounded suspicious even to her own husband. In a performance full of refinement, Remick ensures that Laura is convincing both as a seductress and a victim.

Anatomy Of A Murder expertly dissects a case of death by jealousy, and finds within it societal norms already changing and about to be severely disrupted by a decade of tumultuous upheaval.

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