A young family are visited by ghosts in their home. At first the ghosts
appear friendly, moving objects around the house to the amusement of
everyone, then they turn nasty and start to terrorise the family before
they "kidnap" the youngest daughter. - from IMDb
You asked me to do it; I did it! Late last night, on Halloween Eve, I finally saw the horror classic
Poltergeist.
Poltergeist is one of those films you think you know even if you've never seen it. The poster is iconic, the lines are oft-quoted ("They're here"),
Family Guy remade it in an episode. It's very easy to walk into
Poltergeist and be underwhelmed. Where's the opportunity for surprise and suspense when every twist and turn is part of popular culture?
Well, let me get out of the way first:
Poltergeist is not really that scary, and I don't think you can completely blame overexposure for it. The film just doesn't work that way. The ghosts are big special effects creations, shining lights floating down like the aliens in
Cocoon, or else monstrous skull demons roaring and throwing their heads out of closets. Monstrous and ugly, but not scary. There are moments that made my skin crawl -- the chairs on the table, the steak, the tree -- but it's not like I shivered and sat on the edge of my seat. It's spooky, certainly, but not terrifying. For me, anyway.
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| Still... |
But it'd be nuts to base the quality of
Poltergeist off of that alone. After all, not every ghost flick
has to be chew-your-nails terrifying, and
Poltergeist is obviously not concerned with that anyway. Its focus instead is on the effects these supernatural events have on a family, in particular the mother, played by JoBeth Williams.
I think this is what separates
Poltergeist from all others. Craig T. Nelson's dad Steven is the one who actually goes out and calls on parapsychologist Dr. Tesh (Beatrice Straight) for help, but Williams' Diane is the film's focus. She refuses to leave the house, not wanting to leave her baby stuck in the spirit realm, but she is far from the helpless, hysterical mess this would imply. Instead, it's
Steven who sits by in a chair, doubting the capabilities of his visitors, visibly exhausted, uncertain what to do. As the man, the protector of the family, he is left defeated by a force he can not understand, unable to bring his family through this horror -- it's emasculating, and Nelson gets this emotion through his slack face and confused movements.
As I said, it's the wife who takes charge. She refuses to leave her baby. She stays up with Dr. Lesh, forming a bond in a moving late-night conversation scene, learning more about this
thing that has taken over her house. She puts her trust in medium Tangina. She is the one who puts on the rope so she can fetch Carol Anne from the other side, and she is the one who brings her children out of the house while Steven yells at his boss outside. Of course, she's also the one who at first toys with the idea of having these spirits around, using first her chair, then her
own daughter, in an experiment to see them rush across the floor. She's flabbergasted and excited, but not afraid, and perhaps her vigilance later on is just as much a product of guilt as it is maternal instinct. After all, she literally offered up Carol Anne to the ghosts; what are they gonna do, deny it?
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| DON'T DO THAT |
The conflict between husband and wife is hinted at throughout the film. I love the scene where Diane smokes pot in the master bedroom while Steven, unable to roll a joint, gives up and picks up
Reagan: The Man, The President instead.
I love when she's trying to show him the chair moving across the kitchen and tells him to "Reach back into our past, when you sued to have an open mind. Remember that?" I love when Tangina asks the disciplinarian of the two to call Carol Anne's spirit closer using force and anger, and they argue about which one fits the role. I love
most of all when Dr. Tesh asks Steven to name everyone in the house, with ages. And he names his wife Diane, 32, their oldest daughter Dana, 16....that kills me. You get a real idea of who these two were and are, understanding the dig at Steven's former open-mindedness and Diane's expert rolling of a joint.
It also provides a purpose for the presence of Dana in the story, a character who says nothing, does nothing, and might as well not exist. Ah, but what insight Dana's presence lends! The first child, there's eight years difference between her and son Robbie. And since her parents were both, presumably, in high school, there is a looser hold on her. She is frequently out with friends, apparently allowed to stay out on school nights, and while not open about her sex life, her references to her experiences are left virtually unchecked.
Through these moments,
Poltergeist presents an interesting peek at the changing nuclear family. The free-lovin', free-wheelin', everyone smoke a jay, fuck-the-man, we won't be anything like our parents 60s and 70s is giving way to the Yuppie nirvana of the Reagan 80s. One gets the sense that whatever Steven and Diane did in that time, she was the instigator and he went along because he loved her. It's the one thing about this movie I cannot shake.
Ok, and Zelda Rubinstein as Tangina.
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| Get it, girl! |
There are lots of other things I could discuss, like Dr. Lesh's own awakening to what she's experiencing, or the fact that after seeing four other Tobe Hooper films, I see his fingerprints on this just as much as Spielberg's. But this was all about introducing me to a film so that I could give a Casting Coup. After the jump, of course.
