New #Poltergeist! Who Remembers the Old Curse? #Paranormal #Ghosts

I LOVE ghost stories...I write them, I read them, I watch them--see: Favorite Ghost Stories and Favorite Ghost Movies for the corresponding blog post lists--so when I heard Poltergeist was being remade, my first reaction was "Yes!"  But then my second thought was "Are the actors involved in this crazy?  Have they not heard of the Poltergeist curse?"

A few years back, I researched the so-called Curse of the movie The Exorcist, and what I found was fairly creepy.  So I decided to revisit the Poltergeist curse, to see what was truth and what was rumor.  While a number of people associated with the original three Poltergeist movies have passed away, only two deaths stand out as sudden and unexpected, and both involved actresses in the first movie, which came out in 1982.  The 22-year-old actress who portrayed the older sister Dana Freeling, Dominique Dunne, was murdered by her ex-boyfriend five months after the movie's release.

The little blond girl who most people picture when they think of the movies--the child who announces "They're here" in a spooky singsong voice as static drones from the television set--died suddenly at age 12.  Heather O'Rourke began playing the character Carol Anne Freeling at the age of six.  A seemingly ordinary illness from the flu advanced into septic shock, and she passed away on the operating table in February 1988, before the third movie was released.

A dangerous ghost and an ex-boyfriend await
psychic medium Claire Linden in
Cape Cod's GULL HARBOR
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These tragedies probably have nothing to do with subject of the movie--restless and destructive ghosts under the control of a demon known as the "Beast" who abduct a young girl via her closet. But I can see how the rumors of a curse might start, based on the deaths of young actors starring in a film about ancient spirits and desecrated cemeteries!  Will I go see it?  Oh, yeah, I wouldn't miss it.  I love the adrenaline rush produced by scary films, although I also enjoy the emotional swings and romantic tension generated by movies about star-crossed lovers.  If the combination of both appeals to you like it does to me, try one of my ghost story/romances, GULL HARBOR or SILVER LAKE.  And coming soon, HAUNTED SOULS!  All's fair in love and hauntings--just remember it's okay to sleep with the light on every once and a while.