Do you believe scary movies could curse the
cast or crew? It seems highly unlikely if you are a rational
sort of person, but what we are about to tell you is uncanny. Take the Poltergeist franchise for instance. The little girl that starred in the movies
died mysteriously from toxic shock while making part three when she was just 12 years old. Her older sister in the movie was killed by
her boyfriend just after part two came out, and two other main actors died either just
before or just after a release. This could just be coincidence, but it also
sends shivers down the spines of those apt to believe in the unbelievable. The Exorcist curse story is far worse. There are plenty of movie curses, but today
we’ll focus on just one, in this episode of the Infographics Show, The Amityville Horror:
FACT or FICTION and Was There a Curse? So, let’s start with what the movie was
based on. There was a book published in 1977 called
“The Amityville Horror” by Jay Anson, and it was about what is now called, “America’s
Most Haunted House.” This is what we know from the book: The house in question was situated at 112
Ocean Avenue in the neighborhood of Amityville, Long Island, New York. It’s still there in fact, described as a
1927 Dutch Colonial. It was sold for $605,000 in 2017, much less
than it was on the market for. It could get annoying living there as so many
people visit the place on a horror sightseeing pilgrimage. That’s because in 1975, the mass murderer
Ronald DeFeo Jr. killed his mom, dad, two brothers and two sisters in that house. At first, he was said to be insane, stating
that voices had told him to do it. It was a strange scene for police, as all
the bodies were found face down in their beds, and it seemed there had been no struggle. It’s bizarre because the gun had no silencer,
so no one could figure out why people in the house hadn’t tried to escape or at least
move from their beds. No sedatives were found in the victims, either. Were other members of the family involved? An outsider? demons? By the way, DeFeo has changed his story several
times over the years. Just over a year later, in 1975, George and
Kathy Lutz and their three children (9,7 and 5) moved into this house. They knew about the murders, but the $80,000
they paid for a large old house with a swimming pool and boathouse was nothing short of a
bargain. Now it must be said that Mr. Lutz was a very
religious person and because of what he knew about the house, he asked Father Ralph J.
Pecoraro to bless the place. According to the author of the book, who interviewed
the father, when he turned up that day December 18 to bless the house, he heard a voice of
a man demanding he get the hell out of there. “Get out,” shouted the voice, and the
holy man didn’t need much persuading. Later in an interview for TV, the father said,
“I was also sprinkling holy water, and I heard a rather deep voice behind me saying,
'Get out!' It seemed so directed toward me that I was
really quite startled. I felt a slap at one point on the face.” He called George and told him what had happened,
and warned him not to stay on the second floor where he had heard the voice. After this, crap got real. George started waking up every night at exactly
3.15 am, so awake that he would go for a wander. He later found out that’s when DeFeo had
killed his family. The others slept, but for some reason, they
all slept on their stomachs. Mrs. Lutz started dreaming about the murders
and she also dreamed something weird: she knew who had slept in each room and what order
they had been shot in. It goes on…they found a hidden room that
frightened the life out of the poor dog. This room wasn’t in the plans for the house. They called it the “Red Room.” The house would fill with flies occasionally;
parts of it would turn ice cold, and now and again a putrid odor was emit from certain
areas. The parents saw demon faces in the fireplace,
green stuff coming out of keyholes, and if that wasn’t bad enough, their 5-year old
daughter made a new friend that didn’t actually exist, something described as a demon pig
with green eyes. Doors slammed shut on many occasions, locks
bust open on windows, cloven hoof prints were found in the snow outside, a crucifix turned
itself upside down. You can watch George on YouTube talking about
another occurrence: “Earlier that day I saw Kathy turn into an old woman …during
that night she lifted up off the bed about 3 or 4 inches.” Yep, nothing to see here… But perhaps the defining moment was some invisible
force stamping on Kathy’s chest, causing injury, or the fact George saw all the members
of his house levitating. With the kids tripping, hearing voices and
singing weird songs, and the parents at the end of their tether, they moved out. The family had lasted just 28 days. The parents even claimed at one point that
the demon had followed them to another house, but they didn’t talk much to the press as
they were just about at the point of breakdown. By the way, George and Kathy both took lie
detector tests from some of America’s top polygraph people, and they both passed. Some people said it was a huge hoax to get
money from a book, but the Lutz’s lost money on the house and their belongings. The priest backed them up, as did paranormal
investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. (Those names should sound familiar if you’ve
seen The Conjuring.) 25 years later, when interviewed by the History
Channel, George said, “It’s real easy to call something a hoax. I wish it was, but it wasn’t.” And so, this is America, where no good mass
murder/breakdown/demon story could escape the silver screen. The movie came out in 1979, called “The
Amityville Horror,” starring James Brolin and Margot Kidder. As for the curse, well there are little things,
such as Brolin saying that while he was reading the script, his pants magically dropped from
their hanger, but that’s not such a big deal. As for Kidder, things get a little darker. The woman who is also famous for playing Lois
Lane in Superman went through a series of bad marriages, was hurt badly in a car crash,
went bankrupt, and ended up having a nervous breakdown. She once told the press that what she had
to do was face her demons. She wasn’t referring to the house, but it
might have been a choice of words some people look too much into. In 2018, she died of throat cancer, at age
69. But that’s not suspicious. Ok, so what about the famed writer, Jay Anson,
who started the ball rolling regarding how this house became public knowledge? Well, he died at age 58, less than a year
after the movie came out. He did have a bad heart, though. But the man that was first invited into the
house to check it out was journalist and author named Paul Hoffman. Apparently, the Lutz family thought he was
a criminologist. Anyway, he died a few years after the film’s
release, in a fire, at age 49. As for Ryan Reynolds, who starred in the 2005
remake, he had this to say, “A lot of the crew were waking up at 3:15 in the morning
which was when all these atrocities in the house took place. I think it was a subconscious thing. You read the script and suddenly pop awake
at 3:15 in the morning.” Still, there are many that say the entire
thing was a hoax , and they’ve tried, perhaps sometimes successfully, to debunk some of
the family’s claims. There was no snow, for instance, when the
family said they saw hoof marks in snow. It depends who you believe, though; even the
son still stands by his assertion that the house was haunted, and he has little to gain
from lying. A man named James Cromarty bought the house
in 1977 and he lived happily there with his wife for more than a decade. He told the press, “Nothing weird ever happened,
except for people coming by because of the book and the movie.” So, was the family lying? Or was what they were seeing a case of mass
hysteria? Or, had the demon just moved on to greener
pastures when Cromarty and co arrived? We may never know. But we’ll leave you with this. A guy named Steven Kaplan who was also a paranormal
investigator, didn’t believe the Lutz’s and so set out to write a book about the case,
and to prove once and for all it was a hoax. His book was called ‘’The Amityville Horror
Conspiracy.’ It was published in September 1995, three
months after he died. So, what do you guys think? Haunted or just phony baloney? Let us know your thoughts in the comments! Also, be sure to check out our other video
called Why are We Afraid of Friday the 13th and the Number 13?! Thanks for watching, and, as always, don’t
forget to like, share, and subscribe. See you next time!
