Real-life horror behind Poltergeist movie - and the curse that haunts the film to this day

• By Grace Macaskill

The reality behind the fiction is equally as terrifying with deaths and unexplained spooky goings-on

Child star: Heather O'Rourke died aged 12

It's the creepy cult horror film that terrified cinema-goers in the Eighties and now Poltergeist is due to scare a whole new generation as the remake hits the big screen tonight.

But very few of today's fans will know the petrifying real life events that inspired the film - or the curse surrounding it.

Steven Spielberg's 1982 film sees an ordinary family tormented by an evil apparition which later takes the youngest daughter Carol Anne into another realm. The reboot follows a similar format.

But the reality behind the fiction is equally as frightening. The film is loosely based on events at a house on Long Island, New York, where a family called the Hermann's were plagued by a so-called poltergeist.

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Big sister Dominique Dunne was murdered in real life

Between February and March 1958, bottle tops and lids inexplicably popped, ornaments flew around the house, a heavy bookshelf mysteriously fell over and a Virgin Mary figure soared through the air and struck a mirror 12ft away.

A police officer came to investigate but was almost hit by a flying globe while a British press photographer who went to cover the story witnessed his flashbulbs lift off a table.

A priest was called and ministers from all sorts of faiths conducted rituals on the front lawn but still the strange happenings went on as parents James and Lucille and their two children Lucille jnr, 13, and James jnr, 12, became increasingly scared.

Experts confirmed the house was structurally sound, the fire brigade checked water levels in an old well and equipment set up in the basement confirmed there were no land vibrations. It was a mystery.

Then suddenly, as quickly as it had started, the haunting stopped.

In the new film, the daughter is also haunted by TV ghosts

The family, who moved away soon after, believed the events were somehow connected to an ancient Native American burial site near their home - something which features heavily in Spielberg's movie.

But if you thought the poltergeist who inspired the film was chilling, what followed in the months and years after it's release were even more freaky.

And they earned Poltergiest the title of the most cursed production of all time.

Within weeks of the film's release Dominique Dunne, who played possessed Carol Anne's big sister Dana, was strangled by her boyfriend outside her West Hollywood home. She died days later in hospital.

Actor Julian Beck, 60, who played preacher Henry Kane in the second movie, died of stomach cancer as the film was released and Will Sampson, who took the role of a Native American shaman died after undergoing a heart-lung transplant.

Another small part actor, Lou Perryman, was killed in 2009 when an ex-convict attacked him with an axe at his home in Austin, Texas.

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Native American actor Will Sampson also died after filming

Author James Kahn, who wrote a book to accompany the film, said that seconds after he wrote the line 'Lightning ripped open the sky' his work building was struck by lightening and all the arcade games in the lounge room began playing themselves.

But it was the death of young Heather O'Rourke, who played Carol Anne Freeling , that sealed the film's spooky reputation.

She was misdiagnosed with Crohn's Disease in 1987 and died the following year of a heart attack as doctors operated on a bowel obstruction. She was just 12.

Of course the series of events could be little more than tragic co-incidence but they have kept the spirit of Poltergeist alive.

And, as the reboot hits cinema screens, it's a legend that new viewers may just find haunts them....