duffieldkevin I grew up around the time when the story of the Amityville haunting was hot news and the eagerly anticipated Amityville Horror was released in theaters. It was a hit and one that is still a good watch despite the trend for most modern horror films to focus more on gore or jump scares to grab the audience. I was hooked and read everything Amityville related to the case, watched documentaries, and indulged in every new film that came out, even the ones that were quick cash grabs by using the Amityville name while straying into poor cinematography, cheap scares, and ludicrous plots. Most of the later films are more Mystery Science Theater fodder than anything else. Flash forward to Amityville: The Awakening. I do not consider it a terrible film, but considering the film was cut to back away from an R rating I have to wonder what the original version would have been like. As it stands, it is an enjoyable watch, but one that fails to completely break new ground in the franchise. Like the header says, I see this as the Force Awakens of the franchise. It does a godd job calling back to the original lore and story of the first film, and tries hard to bring some real quality to the production with the cinematography, effects, and acting, but is not as intense or truly frightening as it should have been. In all I found myself liking it more for the nostalgia than anything else. The plot element of the mother being aware of the house's demonic history and believing she could use it to cure her son is a bit contrived, to be honest. There was also at least one plot element that had potential, which was when the doctor caring for the boy in the vegetative state is attacked by flies, but once the scene is done we hear nothing from the character again until the end. It would have been interesting to see the doctor suffer further from the attack and how he contends with it. Given the predictability of the story, its lack of genuinely disturbing or tense moments, I can only say this is an average horror film, but at least one that rises above many previous installments in its production quality. You can tell the people making the film were trying to "do it right" and were it not for this the film would have recieved a much lower score in my opinion. If you are a fan of the franchise, I highly recommend you give the movie a try. It is definitely worth at least a one time viewing but I caution to not set your expectations too high.

jacobjohntaylor1 This is one of the best horror movies I have seen. It has a great story lines It also has great acting. It very scary. This is part 18 to the Amityville series and It is the best one I have seen. This a great movie. See it.

blue-flower-177 Could have been way better, but it is still engaging and decent, the acting is good, great talent!

fjk1138-731-161881 What happens when you expect nothing from a movie, but then get even less than that? Well...you get a piece of crap like this.This is barely an attempt at horror, with barely any scares, and it drips the blood of the series' nostalgia more than anything else. The plot is severely weak, and it's worsened by the fact that it pulls the other movies into the story. No, I don't mean just by referencing the events, I mean they literally reference three of the movies here - one of the characters holds up DVDs of Amityville 1, 2, and the remake and suggests they watch them at 3:15 am. Huh? What?? That is the point where they lost me, and the stupid story took a deep six right down the well to hell right then and there. Speaking of which, that comes into play here yet again (people who have owned the real house have to be just shaking their heads by now) and hey guess what? That's the source of the evil again! Wow, didn't see that coming.The acting is pretty meh, and all I can assume is the actors all had some bills to pay to even participate here. The house looks too neat, new, and clean to have any menace to it. It's also completely physically positioned incorrectly, made worse by the fact that they show photos at the start of the movie of the actual house where you can clearly see how close the neighbors are. And to think that all the other supposed occupants wouldn't have pitched that stupid "high hopes" sign into the trash is completely pathetic. The musical score, while mot bad for what it is, is no match for the creepy, squeaky strings and children's voices that Lalo Schifrin made work far more effectively almost 40 years ago now.There is basically no point to this movie. It's nothing you haven't seen before, quite literally, and it's not worth your time. Don't bother, and I hope the studios all don't bother with future installments either.