I had first watched The Entity about 20 years ago and wanted to revisit it. I remember it being pretty scary and also having a neat special effect where a woman’s breast was getting groped by an unwelcome “invisible guest” (King Diamond reference…I had to). I am a simple man. Anyway, here is my account of the movie.

The Entity is about a young single woman (Barbara Hershey) with a troubled past and three kids. One night she gets violently attacked and raped by an ethereal assailant. This ritual happens a couple more nights. The rest of the movie is spent trying to figure out what the hell is going on. The first couple of times there are no witnesses, so nobody really believes her story. Then you have the clinical psychologist (played by Ron “the Beard” Silver) who comes into action and somewhat muddies the waters with his theories on her troubled past manifesting itself. Throw in a ghostbuster gymnasium obliteration subplot and you have the main storyline of The Entity.

I liked this movie, but somewhere down the line it really went off track. First of all, you have the doctor. He initially enters the story to help Carla out. Then you get the feeling that he is interested in her. Her oldest son doesn’t like her current boyfriend that much, but as soon as the doctor shows up they start bullshitting about car motors. However, the second half of the movie you are despising this guy because he can’t accept the fact that maybe Carla is actually getting her ass kicked by a pissed-off ghost. It really is frustrating at what it takes some of the people in this movie to be convinced that Carla isn’t making this shit up.

The special effects are good. You have the “indented breast” scene that I referred to earlier. It is still impressive, though now in my not-so-naïve years I see clearly how it is done. Still, quite effective and innovative for the time. All the poltergeist activity of mirrors cracking and things moving and flying around was also effective. However, you do have some pretty cheesy ghost lightning that movies of this era never really seemed to pull off convincingly. Other than that, everything was good.

There is really no gore to speak of. The invisible entity does wreak some pretty graphic and extensive violence on our main character. By the way, our main character does doff it for the camera once or twice and you even get a fairly explicit guest appearance from the "early 80’s Beaver". I didn’t remember this from the first time I seen the movie for some strange reason...

Character development was an interesting subplot in this movie. Barbara Hershey’s character was finely constructed and I was very intrigued by her. I also enjoyed the relationship she had with her son. However, nobody else’s character was really extrapolated on. The old boyfriend had no personality. The doctor had great potential but ended up being contradictory to what was initially perceived. There is also this really annoying man who is the husband of her best friend. This guy’s only purpose was unrealistic demands and unintentional humor.

I was left feeling a little empty during the second half of the movie. Things just didn’t feel put together very well. The ending did nothing for me, except for a decent little scare at the very end. That was lost however on my overall dread that an excellent movie lost its way.

Overall, I enjoyed this movie. It had a lot of potential, but ended up unraveling somewhat. The ghostly attacks were vicious and were damn scary. This was supposedly based on a true story. I already know what you’re thinking; a built in gimmick. Take it for what it’s worth. It intrigued me though, since this fact wasn’t released until the credits rolled.

I give this movie 3.25 out of --------hold on. I give this 6.5 out of 10 vicious entities with two little assistants.

This review was fueled by hot chocolate and John Fogerty. He recently won his 35-year lawsuit with his deadbeat record label and now has rights to his own music. Imagine that. One of many reasons why I hate the record industry. In tribute to John, let me hear it! “Hey let’s go, all over the world, rock and roll girl!”

(1981) Sidney J. Furie, Frank De Felitta

Barbara Hershey .... Carla Moran
Ron Silver .... Phil Sneiderman
David Labiosa .... Billy
George Coe .... Dr. Weber
Margaret Blye .... Cindy Nash
Jacqueline Brookes .... Dr. Cooley
Richard Brestoff .... Gene Kraft
Michael Alldredge .... George Nash
Raymond Singer .... Joe Mehan
Allan Rich .... Dr. Walcott
Natasha Ryan .... Julie
Melanie Gaffin .... Kim
Alex Rocco .... Jerry Anderson
Sully Boyar .... Mr. Reisz
Tom Stern .... Woody Browne