Great Film overall

Excellent but underrated film

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

For sequel month, it only fits we'd get a sequel that's pretty pointless. This film became somewhat notorious because of the absence of the elder sister character whose actress Dominique Dunne, was strangled in real life by her boyfriend. The most entertaining bit is probably how this new villain Kane looks a lot like Fred Phelps. Fred Phelps didn't even look like that at the time the movie was made. We actually do get some pretty creative sequences. It's still just mediocre, particularly with how the pacing isn't good.None of the actors and actresses are really bad. It does expand a little on the mythology of the series, but it doesn't really amount to much. I really do praise Heather O'Rourke for her role in this. It's hard to find really good child actresses. The visual effects are quite good, given the year it came out. It still reprises too much stuff, but can be watchable. **1/2

Whose idea was it to expand on Poltergeist? Why was this even made? The family has removed the T.V. that had the poltergeist in it so what's next? Well, there's no T.V. in this one, but another electronic, a phone. Interesting idea but executed averagely.I guess this could've a been a pretty good unwanted sequel if it hadn't fell short from the first one. The third one was forgettable, it was even worse and even more torturous to watch.The third act was predictable and much of the film was underdeveloped. I couldn't care less for the characters and Carol- Anne is now a bratty, whiny girl instead of the brave, sweet girl she used to be. The acting is painfully wooden, the directing was clumsy as was the script.Now, some of the effects were enjoyable, such as the light, which is a plus. But most of the film will just be forgotten quickly.

This disappointing follow-up to the classic POLTERGEIST ('82) rehashes a boring plot which in this case substitutes humour and sentimentalising in place of thrills and chills. Although the high budget means that there are lots of special effects (most of them tacky by today's standards), once again little thought is gone into the story itself, so in the end it's just one "shock" or "scare" after another. This does not a good film make.The film was made four years after the original, but bizarrely is set just one year after the events of that film. Thus, we are expected to believe that the son has grown amazingly from a ten year old to a fourteen year old in that time - I think not. What makes this film so bad is the bad acting of the cast members, most of whom return from the first (aside from the teenage daughter). Most of them were passable in the first film, but they go way over the top here. JoBeth Williams has a ridiculous '80s hairstyle and is totally forgettable in her whinging, irritating role. Craig T. Nelson, on the other hand, goes totally over the top and crazy at regular points, which is pretty funny actually. Oliver Robins has one major scene and that's it, while Heather O'Rourke's cuteness and creepiness had almost totally worn off by now.Zelda Rubinstein also returns but is relegated to a cameo, "stand back and watch" type role. Also turning up are Will Sampson as a useless Native American "advisor" and Geraldine Fitzgerald as an impossibly friendly grandmother. However, the film's biggest coup is in the casting of Julian Beck (who looks like an old version of Christopher Walken) as the evil preacher, who manages to make his evil role really creepy and scary and is by far the best thing in this film. It's just a shame that he died halfway through production and thus vanishes from the proceedings towards the end.Although this film fails as a whole, there are a smattering of fun scenes which stop it from being totally worthless. A couple of slimy monsters turn up (one comes out of Nelson's mouth, the other just appears as a huge, slithering tentacled mess like something out of Lovecraft's worst nightmares) and are good value for money. Eagle-eyed viewers will notice a few connected names in the crew; firstly effects man Steve Johnson (one of the big SFX guys in the '80s) who made the creatures, secondly H.R. Giger being credited for the "designs" of the monsters, and who probably included the Lovecraftian element, and thirdly Screaming Mad George as a hired hand. These factors combine to make the monsters quite cool, although sadly they are seen only briefly.Another good scare has a chainsaw levitating into the air before attacking the family (sheltering inside a car). This has some great special effects which make it a moment to remember. Sadly, another scene in which Robins' brace comes to life and tries to smother him is laughably bad, but original, it has to be said. This time around, a plastic pink toy telephone acts as Carol Anne's "link" to the other side, but not much is made of this plot device. The rotted corpses from the first film also pop up occasionally (out of cupboards, the ground, etc.) but don't make a lot of impact.Probably the worst bit of this film is the ending, which rips off an effective scene in the first film but ruins it by showing everything. Thus we get to watch the family members float around an animated world in scenes which look incredibly fake and cheesy. The low point occurs when we see Carol Anne floating around, symbolised as an angel, or when she gets rescued by the ghost of her grandmother - a moment so bursting with sugary sentiment that I was very close to being physically sick. In the end, nobody dies either, not even the dog! These things make POLTERGEIST II: THE OTHER SIDE a film which is just too family-orientated, and is in desperate need of more of the nastiness of the first film.

Nonsensical supernatural thriller continues the other-worldly nightmares plaguing the TV set-fearing Freeling family, originally introduced in 1982's "Poltergeist". Here, a Native American shaman helps protect the family from the spirit of a demonic, skeletal preacher who wants to possess little Carol Anne. Depressive sequel reunites the central cast members from the original but fails to build on their characters (much of this seems like a cheaply-rendered rerun). Director Brian Gibson mistakes tasteless jolts (such as "the Vomit Monster") for scary thrills--and has a severe case of Spielberg-itis besides. Few involved with the project were satisfied with the results, and smart audiences knew to stay away. *1/2 from ****