The Amityville Horror

The Amityville Horror (1979)

15 mistakes - chronological order

(8 votes)

Continuity mistake: In the scene where the two priests are driving to the Lutz house and the car goes out of control, they alternate between shots of Rod Steiger and Don Stroud. The car's windows switch between closed and open in various shots. (00:42:00)

Continuity mistake: At the end of the movie when the Lutzs' get in their van and drive off; they stop near a dead end sign when George gets out and goes back to get Harry. When he and Harry get back to the van and drive off, the van is farther from the dead end sign than it were before. (01:51:45 - 01:55:25)

Daniel McGann

Continuity mistake: When George stops the van and runs to the house, you see a long distance shot of the van as George gets out. Later on, when George falls in the black/red sludge under the stairs and the shot switches to the van again, it is the exact same shot as before. Right before the shot switches to the family in the van, you can actually see the van driver-side door opening as George gets out. (01:52:05 - 01:53:05)

Continuity mistake: When the stairs are first shown, there's carpet up the middle of the stairs. At the end when they flee the house it's gone.

Continuity mistake: When the dog is pulling George out of the black muck at the end, he's pulling on a piece of George's shirt. But when it cuts to another angle, the dog turns to run away and the piece of shirt is suddenly gone.

Krista

Audio problem: During the thunderstorm at the end, the thunder comes every couple of seconds, it doesn't correspond to the lightning at all, and it sounds exactly the same every time.

Krista

Revealing mistake: You can see Jackie's knuckles are already bloody BEFORE she starts pounding on the closet door.

Other mistake: When George is in the basement, his son starts walking down the stairs. Suddenly a light bulb shatters right next to the boy's head, he screams, and falls violently down the stairs. But when it cuts to George coming over, he's just walking at a normal pace as though nothing happened. (This is just after they move in, before the evil spirits take hold of George, so there's no reason for him not to be alarmed.).

Krista

Character mistake: When Jackie the babysitter is stuck in the closet, she explains to George and Kathy that the door was locked. George says Amy there's no lock on this door. Her real name is Amy and her film name is Jackie.

Continuity mistake: In the beginning, when it shows the outside of the house, we hear Ronald DeFeo killing his family with a gun. But during the house tour, when it shows the murders from the inside point of view, the number of gunshots fired is different than when we heard it from the outside of the house.

Revealing mistake: At times throughout the movie there's a superimposed thunderstorm that rumbles or cracks every few seconds, purely for dramatic effect, and sounds exactly the same.

eaglegrad16

Continuity mistake: When it shows the front door, the structure of the door changes throughout the film.

Revealing mistake: When the lady is showing George and Kathy the kitchen, she casts two shadows because of the stage lights above her head.

Revealing mistake: When Matthew and Gregory go downstairs to answer the door, it's aunt Helena. Right before she pinches Matthew's cheek, you can see it's already red from a previous take.

More quotes from The Amityville Horror

Trivia: When James Brolin was offered the role of George Lutz, he was informed that they didn't have a script to give him. James bought a copy of the novel and began to read it. At two o'clock in the morning, while reading a very intense part of the book, a pair of pants that he had hung up earlier fell to the ground causing him to jump in fright. After that, James agreed to do the film.

More trivia for The Amityville Horror

Question: What is up with that pig thing in the window? Does it have anything do to do with anything?

Answer: That's Jodie. In the book and the supposed "true" story, the Lutz' daughter said Jodie could appear to her in any form he wanted, but usually looked like a pig.

Answer: According to the book (and you can take that for what it is worth), one of the characters saw a pair of glowing red eyes in a window. Later they went outside and found pig tracks in the snow. That is what this scene is trying to convey.

Guy

Answer: The answer that mentions that the pig thing in the window is supposed to be Jodie is correct. However, in the broader spectrum of things, the appearance or the sounds of animals (squeals, growls, etc.) during a haunting is supposed to mean that the haunting is demonic in nature, which the haunting in this story obviously was.

dewinela

More questions & answers from The Amityville Horror

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