Fright Fest - Poltergeist

They're heeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrreeeee.

There's nothing creepier than a child saying that line. Ok, maybe a My Buddy doll. But that's for another post.

Poltergeist was one of the first, if not the first, horror movies I ever saw. I was 4. And as the story goes, my dad let me watch it and my mom found me in my closet crying and saying over and over, "The skeletons are going to get me." I fail to remember that. My mom remembers clear as day. Apparently the skeletons freaked me out more than the fact that Carol Anne just sucked into a closet Hell that looked a lot like mine. Then again, I can't sleep with the closet door open to this day either so maybe it's a subconscious effect.

The movie was original for its time and twists the traditional haunted house cliche. This takes place in a Levittown type of neighborhood where all the houses are one design, there are 2.5 kids per family and everything's fine. It's not some creepy, run down old Victorian built on an old Indian burial ground. It's a pre-fab raised ranch built on an old indian burial ground.

The thing is, it's not just the EVP in the white noise of a TV and Kane that's creepy. What's creepy is that, for some demented reason, the production crew decided to use real human skeletons in the swimming pool scene. And the actors only found out years later. Then there's the Poltergeist curse since its cast members have a tendency of dying. Dominique Dunne, the eldest sister, was murdered by her crazy boyfriend not long after the movie released. Heather O'Rourke, who played the little Carol Anne, developed a disease that ultimately killed her in the middle of filming the third movie. They had to have a body double come in to finish out and had to cut and paste her voice all over the place.

This was the first movie that had me looking at the TV out of the corner of my eye. And to this day I refuse to listen to white noise. Nope. Leave it.