‘Poltergeist’ is a 1982 supernatural horror film directed by Tobe Hooper and written by Steven Spielberg, Michael Grais, and Mark Victor from a story by Spielberg.
‘Poltergeist’ is Steven Spielberg’s vision of a ghost story and has all the hallmarks of the Spielberg blockbuster production. The film has terrific acting, a good storyline, humor, and fantastic special effects for its time.
Spielberg also used a lot of his own childhood fears and put them into the film. Spielberg said: “E.T. is my personal resurrection, and Poltergeist is my personal nightmare. A lot of things in both movies really came from my growing up. Poltergeist is about my fear — of a clown doll, of a closet, of what was under my bed, of the tree in New Jersey that I felt moved whenever there was a windstorm and scared me with its long, twiggy fingers. But Poltergeist is just a suburban ghost story. It’s meant to be a thrill a second, with humor. The most important thing that I wanted to do with this movie was portray a simple, suburban American family that has a sense of humour about life and about science.”
The acting is great from Craig T.Nelson, JoBeth Williams and the late Heather O’Roark.
I enjoyed the foreshadowing elements and the classic scenes like Heather O’Roark in front of the TV and JoBeth Williams up on the bedroom wall.
The film received 3 Oscar nominations for visual effects, sound effects editing and original score. With all the elements of visual effects, sound, acting, directing and screenplay – this is one film that achieves everything you want to see in a motion picture.
Overall, Poltergeist is a marvelous piece of work. Watch it this Halloween season!