House At The End Of The Street (2012)

It is worth watching the whole of this unintentionally funny horror thriller for its final frame in which one of the characters breaks the fourth wall with a look to the camera that beautifully expresses the actors' and the viewers' and - well, everybody's - dismay at every silly thing that's happened up to that point, including incredibly poor continuity, in the story of a mother and daughter (Elizabeth Shue and Jennifer Lawrence, respectively - both fine) who move next door to a murder house.

★★☆☆☆

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The Amityville Horror (2005)

Given the entire series is built upon the premise of providing a paranormal 'out' for a real-life family massacrist, I shouldn't be surprised Ryan Reynold's George Lutz gets such an easy reprieve for dog murder, a wanton and unnecessary Russian Roulette axe game, and emotional and physical spousal abuse ("It was just a bad bout of pinkeye, honey - I won't do it again," you can imagine him saying as the boat speeds away to the non-satanic side of the lake where men like him continue these behaviours of their own accord), but apart from this unchecked male violence, this update of the 1979 horror classic incorporates some great improvements: a thankfully truncated 89-minute runtime; a terrifically improved, gleefully sinister babysitter scene; a sculpted Ryan Reynolds waddling around in pajama bottoms (unless you prefer a sculpted James Brolin waddling around in his y-fronts), and gone is all that "I've gone blind," twaddle with the priest.

★★★☆☆

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The Amityville Horror (1979)

Except that it's hard to get past the fact this movie, the book it is based on, and the movie series it spawned are all the products of loons and their lawyers (slash literary agents, apparently) cashing in on a real-life case of family massacre by paranormalising the events and the killer's motives, this 1979 classic is effective, understated horror - there's restraint; the object isn't simply to bombard with special effects and jump scares - and on offer is a lot of Margot Kidder, James Brolin dagging around in his y-fronts, some creepy scenes involving flies and black goop, and other scenes that beg the interesting question,  "Who copied who - Stephen King and/or Stanley Kubrick from The Shining camp, or Anson and/or Rosenberg from the Amityville camp?

★★★☆☆

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Sinister (2012)

Desperate to repeat his past success, a true crime writer (Ethan Hawke) moves his wife and children into the home of a murdered family and starts documenting what he thinks is their unsolved serial killer case, going cuckoo in the process like Jack in The Shining but not only because he is exposed to the ghastly details of the crimes but also because just as much as viewers he must lament where this solid thriller set-up starts clumsily heading about halfway through.

★★☆☆☆

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