Horror Movie Review: Amityville in Space (2022)

No one, and I mean no one, should go into a film called Amityville in Space and expect quality. Sure, you can claim the old adage that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but let’s be serious here. Not only is this another in a very long line of poorly and cheaply made attempts to cash in on the Amityville name, but it comes from purveyor of terrible films, Mark Polonia, who co-wrote it Aaron Drake and has been responsible for other subpar Amityville efforts like Amityville Exorcism, Amityville Death House and Amityville Island.

Even before you press play, you know it’s going to be a rough watch, but even then, it’s hard to be prepared for just how bad it is.

It has one saving grace and that is the fact that it actually tries to connect to the original house and its supernatural background. Introducing us to Father Benna (Jeff Kirkendall) who has arrived at 112 Ocean Avenue to destroy the evil within once and for all. This attempt sort of works as the evil is ejected, alongside the house and Father Benna, into space.

The film then jumps forward in time to the year 3015 where we meet the crew of the Wyoming, a deep space cruiser whose job is to destroy rogue black holes. They have one nuke left before wrapping up their mission, so when they discover the largest one on record, they head off to wrap things up.

Guess what’s trapped within said black hole?

It’s not the worst set up if I’m being honest and the early portion of the film showcases a sense of urgency and an earnest attempt to entertain. Nothing looks good, and try as they might, the cast can’t make bad dialogue sound good, but it has focus and that had my attention.

Alas, it doesn’t take long for that focus to fall apart and for Amityville in Space’s shortcomings to become more prominent. Polonia and Drake take a ‘kitchen sink’ approach to the story and throw just about everything at the wall in a desperate attempt to make something stick. Of course, with this being an Amityville film, possession is front and centre (nice and cheap to do), but there’s also a demon that takes on different forms. Sometimes humanoid with a hilariously cheap Halloween-store mask, sometimes nothing but a disembodied voice, and sometimes a CGI ball with glowing red eyes. It’s all appropriately cheap and unsurprisingly awful looking, and like so many other Mark Polonia films, it’s wholly uncreative.

That’s my biggest problem with Amityville in Space. The fact that it’s so uncreative. I understand that they’re working with next to no money, but the lack of imagination in the story, the visuals, the sets, the story, and the dialogue is unacceptable. I can forgive almost everything, but being boring is not something I’m willing to overlook. Mark Polania is famous for packing his films with overly long scenes of dialogue, and this is no different. It’s not the worst offender but I still found myself checking the runtime over and over again.

No surprises here, and if you’ve seen a handful of Mark Polonia’s films then you’ll know exactly what you’re getting into here. It’s not the worst of his films, nor is the worst Amityville film, which I suppose is high praise overall.