1986 – Poltergeist II
This movie was not as bad as I remember it being. The plot, while not terrible for a sequel, is far inferior to the first Poltergeist film. That being said, the special effects were also better than my faulty memory made them out to be. And while the ending of the plot was still hokey, the visual effects were pretty good.
The creepy character of Reverend Kane, was able to stand still while other people walked through him. It was a simple, but effective effect. But the effects really kicked into overdrive in the latter half of the movie. It all started with Robbie’s braces coming to life, causing metal wires to shoot out of his mouth like menacing tentacles. By the time his parents could help him, there was enough wire to wrap the poor boy in a cocoon of metal and pin him to the ceiling.
But for me, one of the most memorable effects in the film was when Kane was able to get into the house by possessing the worm in a bottle of tequila. When Stephen swallowed the worm, the evil spirit possessed him. When Stephen’s body rejects the worm, it slithers out of his mouth as a huge, slimy, H.R. Geiger inspired creature that quickly grows into a legless ghoul resembling the preacher. That part was pretty horrifying! It continued to grow until it resembled a massive column of evil, complete with monster claws that lifted Stephen into the air.
One of the effects that looked a little cheesy was when the family tries to escape in the station wagon. A chainsaw turns on and floats through the air, attacking the car. I can’t put my finger on what looked wrong with the effect, but something didn’t seem right. Doing my research, I found that the director had considered making the movie in 3D, and this was one of the few effects that was filmed while that idea was still being considered. Maybe that had something to do with it.
Then there was the climax of the film, in which the four members of the Freeling family voluntarily venture into the spirit world to confront the evil Rev. Kane. We see the family floating in a bright nebulous ether while a giant monstrous blob of monster attacks them. It gets Carol-Anne away from her family and her face shrivels to that of a corpse. Stephen uses a magical Indian spear to kill the beast and he falls away. Unfortunately, Carol-Anne is thrown into the spectral light of the next life. But the spirit of her kindly grandmother rescues her from an early journey to the afterlife. Even though the ending of the story was pretty disappointing, the effect of which it was comprised were pretty good.
Aside from those memorable effects, there were some other simple things like a dream sequence in which Diane is pulled into the ground by rotting skeletons, or another quick shot of dozens of ghostly spirits appearing all over the lawn. Then there was the part where Stephen is thrown across a room after contact with the spirit of the evil preacher coming out of a toy phone. Sigh… Could the story have been better? Yes. But for all that, the effects weren’t bad at all.