Review: The Haunted Mansion

If The Haunted Mansion is remotely tolerable, that may have to do with Elf screenwriter David Berenbaum.

The Haunted Mansion
Photo: Walt Disney Pictures

If The Haunted Mansion, the third film in as many years adapted from a Disney ride, is remotely tolerable, that may have to do with Elf screenwriter David Berenbaum. The opening credits set up the flimsy history that brings real estate power couple Jim (Eddie Murphy) and Sara Evers (Marsha Thomason) to a rundown estate that they think they’re going to sell. And before you can say, “I ain’t afraid of no ghosts,” the Evers clan begins to butt heads with all sorts of kooky ghosts, flying musical instruments, and rotting corpses.

From the threatening paintings to the dry-heaving doors, the film’s haunted house tropes are as familiar here as they were in Lugi’s Haunted House. There’s a non-threatening storybook quality to the film that should go over well with the kids but may just bore parents to death. Less dorky than you’d imagine, The Haunted Mansion also isn’t very inspired. The biggest surprise here may be that Jennifer Tilly, as a ghostly fourtune teller trapped inside her own crystal ball, isn’t best in show. That honor goes to Terence Stamp’s voice inflection.

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Though the perpetually toothy Murphy needs to be cock-blocked a few times (“At Evers and Evers, we want you to be happy for evers and evers” is his company’s shrill motto), Berenbaum seems to have fun making Jim and his son, Michael (Marc John Jefferies), the chicken-shits of the film’s story. Jim tries to help Michael kill a spider but can’t seem to smash the poor thing. His daughter, Megan (Aree Davis), does it for him, and as she walks off, Daddy tells his son, “Whack your own spider!” That’s about as subversive as The Haunted Mansion gets, which is kind of sad considering how genuinely inspired the set designs really are.

Score: 
 Cast: Eddie Murphy, Terence Stamp, Jennifer Tilly, Marsha Thomason, Nathaniel Parker, Dina Spybey, Aree Davis, Marc John Jefferies, Wallace Shawn  Director: Rob Minkoff  Screenwriter: David Berenbaum  Distributor: Walt Disney Pictures  Running Time: 88 min  Rating: PG  Year: 2003  Buy: Video, Soundtrack

Ed Gonzalez

Ed Gonzalez is the co-founder of Slant Magazine. A member of the New York Film Critics Circle, his writing has appeared in The Village Voice, The Los Angeles Times, and other publications.

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