Wishful thinking on my part. This film is not available. Spielberg brought his talent to this TV movie horror. Anyone who saw it will remember the red eyes peering malevolently from the foliage.
-The Sloth
Family buys house in Pennsylvania Dutch country (which oddly looks just like southern California), only to find that it has an malevolent presence that wants to reach out to the new owners.
Shot by Spielberg immediately after Duel, this is a competently made but pretty pedestrian affair. McGavin is fine as the dad, and Bellamy’s guest star bit is the saving grace acting-wise (along with Rubinstein as his weird nephew), but Dennis and Whitaker are annoying, and I ended up rooting for the evil side a bit, to be honest. I guess this might have been scary to CBS viewers in 1972, but today the scariest thing in it is the "Apple Bar Candy" jingle, which is just awful. Spielberg does a good job describing the claustrophobia of suburbia, with a couple uncomfortable and crowded party scenes well communicated by Bill Butler’s cinematography.
IMDb says Alan Jay Factor is playing Alan, but judging by other photos of him, he has a wordless cameo as the exec in the meeting taking Marjorie’s call. Alan the film editor appears to be John Nolan, who IMDb has as a party guest. Still not sure about that though. The party guests are tough to ID, as few get clear shots, and I still can't spot Spielberg himself.
-Dave W.
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