03-010 The Amityville Murders

03-010
The Amityville Murders

At the beginning of The Conjuring 2, we saw Ed and Lorraine Warren appeared in the infamous Amityville haunted house, performing a séance. No further details were given of what was done there. In an interview, James said “I … didn’t want to make another Amityville movie… I don’t think I have anything new to tell.”

The Conjuring Universe has opened a port to allow “Amityville Horror” movies to plug in. In the previous post, I have introduced an almost unheard indie horror movie The Dawn into the universe. Today, I am going to look into another indie horror movie. It is premiered in 2018, one year before The Dawn. And the name is The Amityville Murders.

Movie poster of The Amityville Murders

What is this movie about?

As its poster stated, this movie is based on true events. It honestly reproduced the infamous Amityville killing that happened on the 13^th November, 1974. In that very night, the eldest son of the DeFeo family, Ronald “Butch” DeFeo Jr. killed all of his 6 family members including his father Ronald DeFeo Sr., his mother Louise, his 2 sisters Dawn and Allison, and his 2 younger brothers Marc and John “Jody” Matthew, with a shotgun. All victims were found face down in their beds with no signs of struggles, giving an unexplainable reason of why no one woke up by the loud noise and ever tried to escape. That further leads to an abundant of imaginations on supernatural involvement.

The movie reassembles the Amityville house very well

Apart from historical facts, the movie also focuses on the relationship between the killer Butch and his family, trying to rationalize the killing. For sure, no one knows the truth behind, but the assumption is quite decent. Hollywood creations were also added to support the super nature claims – the house is built on ancient Indian burial grounds, ancient sprits were waken up through seances, etc. These sound quite “conjuring”, don’t they?

Am I over sensitive?

I was a bit allergic when hearing the word "Conjuration" in this movie.

Comments on this movie are generally negative. Many said the movie is boring. Others said it went away from facts. Some also complain on the CG.

Maybe this is one of my first “Amityville” movies, I think it is quite good. First, acting is good. We saw actors from the 1982 Amityville II: The Possession coming back. Diane Franklin is the mother and Burt Young is the granddad. The Amityville Murders does not a part of the Amityville Horror saga canon. But I saw that it tried very hard to tie itself to the previous movies.

The story behind is well known but that is not a reason to conclude a movie as boring. Everyone knows Titanic has sunk to the bottom of the ocean. But we all flocked to watch the movie, didn’t we? This movie is not a documentary. Parts of it ought to be fictional. And the production companies are not any big bosses. Can’t we give them some grace?

Does The Amityville Murders fit into The Conjuring Universe?

Yes, it fits. Very well indeed. First, the movie is quite factual. Real names are used. At the beginning of The Conjuring 2, we saw the Warrens sitting together with the Lutz family in the dining room of the Amityville house. Haunting incident involving the Lutz family is only the second part of the story, which was dramatized in the classic movie The Amityville Horror and its 2005 remake. The Amityville Murders explains the first part of the story.

Also, as a movie filmed in 2018, it matches the genres of other movies in The Conjuring Universe. I think the director has also seen the open portal in The Conjuring 2 and shaped his movie to fit in. By the way, The Amityville Murders was produced by the same production team of The Haunting in Connecticut. It seems to me that they have finally realized kicking the Warrens out of their first movie was a mistake and wanted to join the “game” again.

How does The Amityville Murders connects with The Dawn?

Both are independent movies made by different companies. Both movies were not written to connect to each other but to The Amityville Horror.

The ending of the movie

At the end of The Amityville Murders, we saw a real estate agents showing the Amityville house to a couple, presumably they are the Lutz’s. And The Dawn uses Jeremiah Ketchum as the link. The demon left Rose and followed Jeremiah to Amityville, causing all the chaos, including the hauntings on the DeFeo and the Lutz families.

In the next post, I will look into the classic, The Amityville Horror from 1979 and its 2005 remake. Let us see how these movies connect with The Dawn, The Amityville Murders & The Conjuring Universe.

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