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I have a sneaking suspicion that Amityville was added to the title well after production wrapped. Maybe I’m just a paranoid dope. Two paranormal buffs from Florida (gross) are intrigued by the legend of “America’s scariest road” (just look at the title, we’re close enough to the top) and head out to the Long Island woods to investigate, looking to catch proof of the supernatural. Charlie and Buzi ignore the warnings of the local populace and get exactly what they deserve when they confront the evil inhabiting the area. The opening (following the static credits playing over the street sign for Mt. Misery Road as color filters are abused) showcases the worst case of mid-life crisis I’ve seen in a long while. Unfortunately, this man is our protagonist. And even more unfortunately, it’s not a joke because this dude playing our lead is the writer and director. He gets mail containing pictures of orbs care of “Joey from Long Island” and Charlie and his mail-order girlfriend (not stated, just assuming thanks to her accent and Charlie’s overall looks and demeanor) are super excited to head out to Long Island and investigate. There’s a bunch of legends in the area from escaped mental patients to glowing-eyed hellhounds… everything the spooky-time fans could want. They spend a good amount of the time reading about the place on the internet and talking about the creepy things they are reading about on the internet. Hope you like illustrations of Mothman because there are dozens of them flashing across the screen as Charlie comments on his glowing red eyes. We then join our two heroes in a bar where Buzi dances seductively (if you’re into the kind of dancing someone does when they’ve been trapped in a crate for years and really don’t want to piss off the rich man who has paid for their services) to a song that just repeats the phrase “shake that booty”. We get filled in on more history of the area by a guy reading from cue cards and awkwardly sipping beer as Charlie robotically tells him to “tell us more” and replies robotically with “that’s fascinating”. All of this is nearly drowned out by background audio because it was all filmed in a real bar which was probably owned by someone who owed our lead cocaine and/or prostitute money. A half-hearted warning is rightfully ignored because I wouldn’t listen to some elderly weirdo barely emoting and going on about cursed land. “Spooky” POV camera shenanigans hover around the sleeping couple and after focusing on Buzi, she gets up to go the bathroom. Why are we seeing this? Probably because star/director/writer/producer/cinematographer/art director/set director Chuck Morrongiello likes watching his wife pee. She sees the Mothman, screams and wakes up the next day. Off to scenic Long Island and a montage of airport and airplane shit while another terrible song about Buzi having a nice booty plays over the home-footage-quality stupidity. They talk to a historian (also drowned out by background audio) who warns them there’s a high chance of death if they journey out to the place and calls them idiots… but they are idiots, so here we are. Do you like watching people wander around the woods and remembering every so often to mention what they’re there for? I hope so because that’s the back half of the movie. This shit is a train wreck and you’ll be laughing until you realize you’ve spent more time with it than you should have and the joke is on you. You get to struggle with paying attention as they struggle with dialogue and human emotions. Imagine Blair Witch done by a local theatre group… no, scratch that. That’s giving this way too much credit. Ok. Imagine Blair Witch done by some dude from high school who was a complete and utter asshole and is now living an infuriatingly blessed life. You won’t be concerned for the duo of dopes but you will be concerned for Buzi actress Karolina Morrongiello because she may be the victim of human trafficking. I don’t think Amityville was mentioned at all.
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