Amityville II: The Possession (1982) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)

• 5.3 ... The Amityville Horror (1979)
• 4.0 ... Amityville II: The Possession (1982)
• 3.1 ... Amityville 3-D (1983)
• 3.2 ... Amityville: The Evil Escapes (1989) (TV)
• 2.6 ... The Amityville Curse (1990) (V)
• 3.2 ... Amityville 1992: It's About Time (1992) (V)
• 2.6 ... Amityville: A New Generation (1993) (V)
• 3.2 ... Amityville: Dollhouse (1996) (V)

The original film had been a major financial success, so a follow-up was inevitable. The only unanswered question was, "What should it be about?" The first film had been based on the experiences of the Lutz family, who moved into a house that had once been the source of six bloody murders. The Lutzes found that the house was a source of evil manifestations. In real life, the Lutz family escaped uneventfully, and nothing exciting ever happened in the house after the Lutzes moved out, other than tourists trampling the begonias. There was no possibility to continue the story chronologically, so the logical course for the follow-up film was to go back in time to the only dramatic thing that had ever actually happened in that house - the 1974 DeFeo family murders.

(Court TV has an excellent story about the DeFeo family murders, if you want to catch up on the events which inspired Amityville II.)

The film changed the name of the slaughtered family to Mottoli, lost one of the murderer's brothers, and seems to have time-traveled the story forward to 1982 based on the cars we see. Apart from that, the script basically kept the DeFeo family members as central characters in the film, appropriating major aspects of their actual personalities and using events from their lives. Just as in real life, the oldest son in the movie family ended up killing his parents and his siblings. The film deviates from the true story in that it assumes the kid's mental problems were authentic external sources (demons from the house) rather than delusions generated by an abusive upbringing and vast quantities of drugs. The actual trial of Ronald "Butch" DeFeo did involve a debate over the cause of his mental state, but demons had nothing to do with it. His guilt actually hinged on whether he was a deranged psychopath incapable of distinguishing right and wrong, or simply a calculating and cold-blooded killer. Even the insanity defense was not predicated on his belief in demons or the supernatural. That was all fabricated after the fact .

Of course, this script had to introduce the supernatural element to make the story mesh with the mythology already established by The Amityville Horror and, for the first two thirds of the film, it succeeded at least to the extent of presenting marginally watchable rubbish. The last third of the film, however, diverges completely from quality as well as reality. I do not just mean the reality of the DeFeo case, but the greater sense of reality involving the laws which govern the universe. It's just downright silly. A priest gets involved with the murderer, breaks the murderer out of jail, and heads to the house for some serious guy-on-priest exorcism action. All of that was ludicrous, and none of it had any factual basis at all. The real Ronald DeFeo Jr is still incarcerated somewhere, still unexorcised. As for the house, there were no further paranormal phenomena reported after the Lutzes left.

Amityville II is just about as good as you might expect from its 4.0 at IMDb, which is to say not good at all. I believe you will consider it a waste of your time. I suppose you might derive some titillation from the belief that certain parts of it are based on reality, but the only titillation I got was seeing Diane Franklin's breast. Ms. Franklin, you will recall, was the designated 80s "girl next door" cutie in every commercial ever made and such films as Better off Dead, The Last American Virgin, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, and Second Time Lucky. Miss Franklin is now tentatively returning to the spotlight after fifteen years as a private citizen. She sang the National Anthem at a Dodger game last year. Here is a recent picture, in which she seems not to have aged a minute since her adventure with Bill and Ted in the late 80s. Get more info about her at dianefranklin.com.

Despite Franklin's presence, I can't imagine why you would want to watch this movie. Her breast is given too little screen time to generate any heat, and the second half of the film is sheer crap.