Poltergeist 25th Anniversary (1982)

"One of the best horror flicks ever...bar none...  Clint Morris, MovieHole
"...delivers real punch in its depiction of a family's struggle against forces they cannot understand or manipulate.  Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice
"Still scary - a classic!  Karina Montgomery, Cinerina
"Sensationally scary! A roller-coaster ride!  Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
"Marvelously spooky, like a thoroughly enjoyable nightmare.  Vincent Canby, The New York Times

Editor's Note Ghosts invade suburbia in this 1982 horror film from director Tobe Hooper (TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE) and producer Steven Spielberg. Life in the Freeling family's tract home is comfortably bland, but frisky poltergeists soon put a little excitement into their daily routine--moving furniture and communicating with their youngest daughter, Carol Anne, through the television set. Unfortunately, harmless pranks quickly turn nasty and the previously friendly ghosts kidnap Carol Anne, trapping her in the spirit world. To win the child back, the family calls in a team of parapsychologists and a psychic who conducts an elaborate exorcism. The apocalyptic finale is deliciously macabre, and pushed the limits of the PG rating. A number of sequels followed, and speculation still remains on whether Spielberg--who wrote the story and storyboarded the action--essentially ghost directed the film.

	Craig T. Nelson
	Heather O'Rourke
	JoBeth Williams
	Richard Lawson
	James H. Spencer - Production Designer
	Jerry Goldsmith - Original Music By
	Matthew F. Leonetti - Cinematographer
	Michael Grais, et. al. - Screenplay
	Michael Kahn - Editor
	Steven Spielberg - Editor
	Steven Spielberg - Based On Story By
	Steven Spielberg, et. al. - Producer
	Tobe Hooper - Director

"They're here!" ---- Carol Anne Freeling (Heather O'Rourke) about the poltergeists

Variety
"...[The film is] strong on technique....Well-acted....Williams is terrific..." 05/26/1982

New York Times
"...POLTERGEIST is like a thoroughly enjoyable nightmare, one that you know that you can always wake up from....Witty in a fashion that Alfred Hitchcock might have appreciated..." 06/04/1982 p.C16

New York Times
Included in The New York Times "10 BEST FILMS OF 1982" 12/26/1982 p.II:17

Empire
4 stars out of 5 -- "POLTERGEIST balances genuine scares with light relief and a top performance from Heather O'Rourke....Classic stuff." 11/01/2007 p.202

Total Film
3 stars out of 5 -- "The performances are solid, the themes intriguing and the whispery build-up effective..." 12/01/2007 p.150

Variety 6 of 10
Given the talents, Poltergeist is an annoying film because it could have been so much better. Certainly, the subject is interesting, a persistent parapsychological phenomenon that defies scientific explanation, yet refuses to go away...But producer Steven Spielberg and the director Tobe Hooper, don't really care. They're fully content to demonstrate how well they can create the physical manifestations, plus a lot of standard sideshow horrors...But the story is truly stupid, though well-acted. Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams are the parents, living almost wall-to-wall with their neighbors in a suburban development. But when the furniture starts to fly around the room and the big tree in the yard gets hungry for the kids nobody ever seems to notice. Here you have a house in the middle of the street going berserk in Dolby Stereo and nobody calls the cops. But Williams is terrific as the mother, at first amused by the strange goings-on in her kitchen and later terrified when cute little Heather O'Rourke disappears into the walls. And Zelda Rubinstein walks off with the film as the miniature lady who comes to cleanse the house.

Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
Special effects in the movies have grown so skilled, sensational, and scary that they sometimes upstage the human actors...In Poltergeist, for example, the cast is made up of relatively unknown performers, but that's all right because the real stars are producer Steven Spielberg (Raiders of the Lost Ark), director Tobe Hooper (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre), and their reputations for special effects and realistic violence. Their names on this horror film suggest that its technology will be impeccable. And they don't disappoint us. This is the movie The Amityville Horror dreamed of being...The movie takes place in Spielberg's favorite terrain, the American suburb...The haunted house doesn't have seven gables, but it does have a two-car garage. It is occupied by a fairly normal family (two parents, three kids) and the movie begins on a somewhat hopeful note with the playing of "The Star Spangled Banner" as a TV station signs off...Nobody ever does decide whether a poltergeist really is involved in the events in the house, or who the poltergeist may be, but if that doesn't prevent them from naming the movie Poltergeist I guess it shouldn't keep us from enjoying it. - Roger Ebert