Main cast: Ryan Reynolds (George Lutz), Melissa George (Kathy Lutz), Jesse James (Billy Lutz), Jimmy Bennett (Michael Lutz), Chloë Grace Moretz (Chelsea Lutz), Rachel Nichols (Lisa), and Philip Baker Hall (Father Callaway)
Director: Andrew Douglas

This remake of the 1975 horror movie seems unnecessary even from a cosmetic point of view. Sure, the production values are better, the house looks creepier, and everything looks shiny and expensive as expensive new movies created from sophisticated newfangled studio thingies tend to be nowadays, but this movie is still as stupid as the 1975 original.

I mean, come on, this movie is basically about the Lutz family moving in to this house that has a history of someone brutally murdering his whole family just one year ago. The house is indeed haunted. The daughter, Chelsea, starts befriending some invisible girl. George, the children’s stepfather, starts acting like he’s being possessed by a very angry spirit. Then again, maybe he’s just being human because I swear, the three Lutz kiddies are annoying enough to drive anybody crazy. The eldest kid Billy is a complete brat, rude and obnoxious, especially. I don’t think I’m the only one cheering for George to whack him off with an ax.

Let’s face it, anyone who stays in a haunted house for so long when weird things are happening left and right really deserves to die. Any mother who doesn’t drag her daughter, who talks to invisible girls and attempts to jump off the roof, to a shrink deserves a hit in the head with a rolling pin. The fact the Lutz folks are so, so dim-witted to stay put in the house is one annoying illogical premise that this movie tries to sell. I’m not buying it.

But after all that is said and done, the movie does have some genuinely enjoyable and scary moments, like a scene involving a babysitter getting shocked nearly to death. But this remake isn’t pointless at all, oh no, because at the end of the day, this movie is perfect Ryan Reynolds soft porn. That guy takes off his shirt so often, revealing his fine physique that clashes with his baby face that he tries to “adultify” with a beard, and goes about in those pajama bottoms that threaten to fall off his lean hips, to the point that I find myself watching this movie to the end mostly because I’m hoping to see those pants fall off. When God decided that hot guys should have deep, almost etched-in-stone girdles of Apollo, he must have used Ryan Reynolds as a prototype.

So yeah, The Amityville Horror has irritating children and stupid people all around living in a haunted house where the ghosts must be wondering what they have to do to actually get rid of the nimrods, but really, there is also Ryan Reynolds running around half-dressed and flexing those biceps. Call me shallow but sometimes the latter is enough to persuade me to turn a blind eye on the former.