The 1982 summer smash showed that scary movies had a place in a suburban setting and in the multiplex for a family audience
Photograph: MGM/Allstarreleased two movies in consecutive weeks, Poltergeist and ET the Extra Terrestrial, that now seem like mirror images of each other. Both are about suburban enclaves visited by supernatural phenomena – one a haunting, the other a close encounter of the third kind – and both are ultimately storybook affirmations of the American family, which is made stronger through crisis.
In the brilliant opening sequence, Poltergeist strikes from the heart of every suburban home: the television set. As the man of the house, Steven Freeling snoozes in his recliner, a TV broadcast channel signs off for the night with The Star-Spangled Banner and the ghostly static that will carry it through to the next morning.
When Carol Anne gets sucked into the bedroom closet, however, the film shifts gears, and the Freelings are willing to try anything to rescue her from the house’s walls, where her voice can still be heard at a distance. Does she walk to the light or away from the light? Three parapsychologists from the local college are at a loss, but they get some help from Tangina , a spiritual medium who assures Diane that her daughter is alive and in the house.