Given the complete shock to the system that was Amityville 1992: It's About Time, actually delivering a well made and fairly entertaining movie in this largely lamentable series, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that it didn't take long for another sequel to emerge that doesn't really have much to do with the original, following the tried and, uh, 'tested' method of a haunted item from the Amityville House somehow takes the haunting travelling.
I don't think it's ever stated exactly where it's set, although it was filmed in LA. It's that generic, run down US cityscape that early 90s movies love. This comes complete with the protagonist's abode, some sort of converted warehouse apartment block. Needless to say, they're all artists. Our main man a photographer by the name of Keyes Terry (Ross Partridge) who stays with his girlfriend Llanie (Lala Sloatman) next door to painter Suki (Julia Nickson) under the landlords Dick (David Naughton) and Jane Cutler (Barbara Howard) as they struggle to draw attention to their art.
One day Keyes is drawn to a homeless man (Jack Orend) who he photographs. In return, the man insists he takes his one possession, a family heirloom of a large gothic mirror. When those left alone with the mirror start to come to grisly ends, Keyes starts to suspect and dig into the history of the homeless man - but how does he fit into the puzzle himself?
Following my slightly raised expectations on the back of a watchable previous movie, and a cast with quite a few pleasantly familiar faces, not even touching on Richard Roundtree's short role as a fellow artist and Terry O'Quinn's more significant stint as a cop investigating matters, my hopes took a nosedive in the first few minutes when the music, setting and cast instantly developed a recognisable sense of dread, an unmistakable atmosphere of horror. No, I don't mean the movie has a vibe, I mean it made me think of Hellraiser 3. Honestly I swear this has been made after hours during the production of that turkey.
As proceedings went on, it's got its issues but it is at least slightly better than that. Which is some sort of bizarre paradox when an Amityville sequel is better than anything. It makes a interesting attempt at actually connecting proceedings to Amityville, albeit this is completely half-cooked which is one of the movie's more annoying factors. We've now seen more than one 'possessed artefact' movies, and a good few 'house possessing people' ones, but this actually tries to at least tease merging the two, even if the house itself never appears beyond visions in the mirror.
It's quite something when an Amityville movie's most frustrating trait is things it almost does, as opposed to a plethora of stupid things, but this really is the case here. There's characters like those of Nickson and O'Quinn who I'd have been up for seeing much more of, and the ending just seems very...abrupt. Like they start off down the path of Keyes' history but ultimately have to cut that short so we can attempt to wrap things up.
Reminding me of the atrocious Hellraiser sequel (well ok I'm saying that as though 3 is the only bad Hellraiser, but it's the MEMORABLY bad one) actually has one positive, production values aren't bad at all. Partridge was possibly an unusual choice for lead given some of the players, and his hair has a life of its own, but I found him quite workable at this level. Certainly he isn't bad in the scenes a bit more actual acting are required, and he's possibly the biggest victim of his character's potentially interesting arc being underdone. O'Quinn is also very good in a rare good guy role. It's like Ronny Cox in the 1990 Captain America; I'm constantly awaiting a heel turn that never arrives. Naughton is a tad disappointing though, I'd have preferred they swapped more of his time for Julia Nickson.
This is a really hard film to try and call. It's not good by any stretch, but realistically it is any better than it has any real right to be. Considering the majority of films with 'Amityville' in the title are, well, awful, this is a fairly generic 90s horror movie, even down to the lame subtitle...but that's honestly a solid landing for a series that's missed far more than it hit. It's not something I'd recommend to anyone, but if you are going to subject yourself to an Amityville movie you could do much, much worse.
I don't think it's ever stated exactly where it's set, although it was filmed in LA. It's that generic, run down US cityscape that early 90s movies love. This comes complete with the protagonist's abode, some sort of converted warehouse apartment block. Needless to say, they're all artists. Our main man a photographer by the name of Keyes Terry (Ross Partridge) who stays with his girlfriend Llanie (Lala Sloatman) next door to painter Suki (Julia Nickson) under the landlords Dick (David Naughton) and Jane Cutler (Barbara Howard) as they struggle to draw attention to their art.
One day Keyes is drawn to a homeless man (Jack Orend) who he photographs. In return, the man insists he takes his one possession, a family heirloom of a large gothic mirror. When those left alone with the mirror start to come to grisly ends, Keyes starts to suspect and dig into the history of the homeless man - but how does he fit into the puzzle himself?
Following my slightly raised expectations on the back of a watchable previous movie, and a cast with quite a few pleasantly familiar faces, not even touching on Richard Roundtree's short role as a fellow artist and Terry O'Quinn's more significant stint as a cop investigating matters, my hopes took a nosedive in the first few minutes when the music, setting and cast instantly developed a recognisable sense of dread, an unmistakable atmosphere of horror. No, I don't mean the movie has a vibe, I mean it made me think of Hellraiser 3. Honestly I swear this has been made after hours during the production of that turkey.
As proceedings went on, it's got its issues but it is at least slightly better than that. Which is some sort of bizarre paradox when an Amityville sequel is better than anything. It makes a interesting attempt at actually connecting proceedings to Amityville, albeit this is completely half-cooked which is one of the movie's more annoying factors. We've now seen more than one 'possessed artefact' movies, and a good few 'house possessing people' ones, but this actually tries to at least tease merging the two, even if the house itself never appears beyond visions in the mirror.
It's quite something when an Amityville movie's most frustrating trait is things it almost does, as opposed to a plethora of stupid things, but this really is the case here. There's characters like those of Nickson and O'Quinn who I'd have been up for seeing much more of, and the ending just seems very...abrupt. Like they start off down the path of Keyes' history but ultimately have to cut that short so we can attempt to wrap things up.
Reminding me of the atrocious Hellraiser sequel (well ok I'm saying that as though 3 is the only bad Hellraiser, but it's the MEMORABLY bad one) actually has one positive, production values aren't bad at all. Partridge was possibly an unusual choice for lead given some of the players, and his hair has a life of its own, but I found him quite workable at this level. Certainly he isn't bad in the scenes a bit more actual acting are required, and he's possibly the biggest victim of his character's potentially interesting arc being underdone. O'Quinn is also very good in a rare good guy role. It's like Ronny Cox in the 1990 Captain America; I'm constantly awaiting a heel turn that never arrives. Naughton is a tad disappointing though, I'd have preferred they swapped more of his time for Julia Nickson.
This is a really hard film to try and call. It's not good by any stretch, but realistically it is any better than it has any real right to be. Considering the majority of films with 'Amityville' in the title are, well, awful, this is a fairly generic 90s horror movie, even down to the lame subtitle...but that's honestly a solid landing for a series that's missed far more than it hit. It's not something I'd recommend to anyone, but if you are going to subject yourself to an Amityville movie you could do much, much worse.