It appeared to be from the 1970’s. I watched it in the very early 1990’s. It was a family-friendly horror comedy. The movie was about a boy living with his older sister and two parents in a house in which sometimes monsters appeared. The family may have had a dog as well.
The boy drew or wrote often. And every time he was unsatisfied with what he drew or wrote he would crumple the piece of paper he was writing or drawing from and throw it in the waste basket. When he did so, a different thing would happen each time. In one scene the waste basket burst into flames. In another the basket spat the crumpled paper back out and into the dad’s dinner. Prompting him to tell the boy that if he wants food he should just ask for it.
There was an old man wearing a suit who controlled the monsters. Sometimes he wore a hat. At the end of the movie the house was transported to another dimension and the boy had the final confrontation with the old man. There were very trippy visuals as the house existed in a psychedelic dimension during the final battle.
Thank you for helping, but this one isn’t it. There was no evil doll in the movie. I do believe the patriarchal figure in the movie was the boy’s dad and not a stepdad nor uncle. There also weren’t any other children (unless you count the older adolescent sister as a child, she looked to be in her mid-to-late teens) in the film. Just the boy.
Making Contact does look interesting, though. So, if nothing else, at least I have a a new addition to my list. Still, I hope I find the movie I watched someday.
In thinking some more about the movie I managed to remember a particular detail about it that I had forgotten about. While I do not 100% trust this memory, I do believe that it is likely an accurate recall.
Throughout the film portals opened in the house where the monsters might have come through. I used image editing software to re-create what these portals looked like. This is the first image edit that I made.
A memory that I 100% trust is of the final battle at the climax of the film. I re-created the view from inside the house in this second edit. I believe this mental image has stayed with me all these years because, up to that point, the portals had only appeared in single doors or windows, but at that point it appeared in multiple doors/windows as if to show the house was sent to another dimension.
I re-created the visual from that climax in this second edit.
If these images can stir the memories of anybody else who may have also seen this movie then any information you could provide would be appreciated.
