The Amityville Horror
The Amityville Horror—that is, the “true” story told in the best-selling book, which in turn inspired the hit 1979 movie—is a notorious paranormal hoax. But there’s actual tragedy in its backstory, which is that in 1974, Ronald DeFeo Jr. shot his parents and four siblings as they slept in what soon became Amityville’s most infamous house. Fascination with the awful mass murder lent credibility to the ghost story, and it’s surely a big reason why we’re still getting Amityville-themed movies nearly five decades later.
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