Poltergeist – 1982
I have to start this off by saying that this is one of my favorite movies of all time. I love the story, but I also love the visuals. The incredible non-CGI special effects, while not perfect, were pretty phenomenal. There were effects that were clearly physical or mechanical constructs, but then there were others that looked like creepily ethereal tricks of light and shadow. Others looked like barely passable hand-drawn animation, and still others looked like perfect and seamless illusions that amaze the eyes of the viewers.
The movie was a special effects extravaganza. There were too many to mention them all, I’ll comment on a few of my favorites and a few of my least favorites. For example, the first effect that looked fake was a hand-drawn animation of a ghostly hand that reached out of a television. Its movement was a little jerky. Next there was the abduction scene. When Carol Ann gets sucked into the closet, we see her hand gripping the plastic flower bed frame. We see her hand slip off. Then we see her flying toward the closet with a large piece of the bed frame still clutched in both hands. Maybe this was an editing error and not a special effects error.
Next was the scene where a man tears his own face off. Everything looked great until the large chunks of flesh started coming off his skull. The dummy head looked too much like a dummy head, and the hands tearing at the face were badly positioned, making them appear to not belong to the same body, which of course, they weren’t. But that was it. Those minor things were the worst of the lot.
I loved the simple effect when the chairs suddenly stacked themselves on the kitchen table, accomplished by a combination of perfectly timed camera work and a crew of people rushing to move the chairs off camera. I also loved the luminous spirit that descended the stairs, revealing itself to the terrified family and their guests. The tiny ectoplasmic tendril that reached out and pushed the hanging light fixture was a really nice touch. I also loved the rescue scene in which Diane enters the spirit realm to retrieve her daughter. The giant skull with the flaming eyes that jumps out of the closet at Stephen was awesome. And the image of Diane and Carol Ann falling through the portal in the living room ceiling was perfect!
The second abduction attempt was really great, too. Diane getting pushed up the wall and across the ceiling was really cool, though if you watch closely, you can see the room shake a tiny bit as it is rotated. The scary clown that attacks Robbie is horrifying. The ghostly dragon skeleton that threatens Diane was very scary! When Diane flings open the bedroom door to save her children, and is almost sucked into the closet with them, was really exciting. The coffins and rotting skeletons erupting through the floor were truly terrifying! And the complex image of the entire house being sucked into the portal was amazing! There was so much that director Stephen Spielberg… I mean Toby Hooper, got right, and although I’m not a huge fan of horror films, I love this one!