Haunted Mansion

I get that Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl was a huge hit, liked by critics and loved by audiences. Not only that, but Jack Sparrow became a household name, so much so that he became the defining part of that series, five movies long with another in development, and is the only remaining tie to the first one. But that seems to be the only true success from the six previous attempts Disney’s made at adapting its rides, including 2003’s The Haunted Mansion. Yes, the Pirates franchise has made Disney a truly stupid amount of money, but that has more to do with the wonderful performance of Johnny Depp in that first one than anything about the ride itself. Which is to say that Disney really needs to internalize the lesson that rides don’t make a great basis for a movie. Because even when that movie works, it’s not because of the ride, it’s in spite of it.

I’ve never seen that 2003 adaptation of the Haunted Mansion ride, so I can’t comment on it or why it was so poorly received by critics and audiences alike. But it is fascinating that Disney decided to take another bite at the apple. Sure, it makes a little sense, given that haunted house movies are their own type of horror film. But I’d have thought the dismal reaction and lukewarm box office would have scared them off, especially since they’ve so many rides to choose from.

The 2023 version begins with Gabbie (Rosario Dawson) and her son Travis (Chase W. Dillon) moving into an old mansion in New Orleans (“a most paranormal place”). Upon discovering it’s haunted, they call on some help from Father Kent (Owen Wilson), who in turn brings in Ben (Lakeith Stanfield), a former astrophysicist who now leads walking tours of the city. Along with mediocre medium Harriet (Tiffany Haddish) and disheveled professor of the paranormal Bruce (Danny DeVito), they must figure out the history of this place in order to unlock the mystery of why these ghosts seem to want them to stay.

Our way in is Ben, who’s depressed after the death of his wife Alyssa (Charity Jordan). In fact, we quickly learn that his skepticism of the paranormal is born of bitterness. Alyssa led ghost tours, and Ben even used his scientific brilliance to build a spectral camera, which resulted in the death of his career. But when you’re followed home by a maritime ghost who floods your apartment and washes you out to the street, you don’t really have much choice but to believe.

For some reason, the bits of Ben and Alyssa’s relationship they show or that he talks about really hit me. They don’t do a bunch to set it up (save for their cute meeting as the movie’s first scene), so it’s pretty unearned. And yet Stanfield played it so well that I felt it.

Story wise, that’s one of the few things that worked. The movie refuses to settle down for much of the first act, instead transitioning you through various quick scenes in what’s almost a montage. It’s bloated in the interest of trying to justify its length, leading to character beats that quickly reverse themselves. For example, why bother starting Ben out as a skeptic when he has this ghost camera, and for the whole movie to happen we know he needs to believe? Sure, it establishes his bitterness towards life after Alyssa’s death, but very little comes of that. His love for her matters, but not his disbelief in the afterlife. And it’s not like him coming to believe is some character growth: he sees physical evidence of them, so faith is not required.

The rest of the characters are just sorta there. While they do mostly have stated desires, we never really feel them. They’re spat at us and then we move on. The characters are important for driving the plot forward, but they feel like shallow schtick instead of full people. While Dawson is charming as hell as Gabbie, she pulls it off through a character whose main personality trait is sarcasm and snark. She is the audience surrogate, unimpressed by this motley crew. Because everyone else is just flat. Sure, they’ve all got their thing and they’re swinging hard, but they are not connecting. This movie is desperately trying to be a comedy, and while every now and then there’s a decent joke, so few of them connect that it’s just embarrassing after a while.

Part of the issue is the split narrative. Given that there’s so much they’re trying to bring in, spending a decent amount of time on William Gracey (J.R. Adduci) only to reveal he doesn’t actually matter and we should be investigating the Hatbox Ghost (Jared Leto) is a bit of whiplash. Especially since we dwell on both of their backstories. On top of getting to know the ensemble, and Madame Leota (Jamie Lee Curtis), it’s too much, which keeps you at arm’s length instead of getting into the plot. And even more once the true stakes are revealed to be a boring retread of so many other movies.

One of the strangest things with modern big budget movies is that you cannot rely on the special effects being good, despite the huge sums of money behind them. Haunted Mansion is no difference. They’re so uneven, going from fine enough to downright gaudy and cheap. I don’t know the production history of this film, but it felt rushed, and one of the things to suffer most in modern movies in Crunch Time is special effects. That shouldn’t happen at Disney, but then, that’s why animators so often complain about working conditions in the industry (and some just voted to unionize!).

One other weird bit is the egregious amount of product placement in the film. That’s not unique here, of course: most blockbusters do it. And we all reference products or brands or pop culture or whatnot all the time, so it’s perfectly natural that fictional characters would do so, too. But we don’t go around just yelling brand names for no reason, and as such movies usually have the sense to hide it in the background, or at least slide it seamlessly into some dialog where it makes sense. Rarely is it as obvious and clunky and in your face as here. Gabbie says she bought the mansion on Zillow unprompted, Yankee Candle and Amazon are brought up in a single sentence during the seance, and Travis is holding a Monopoly box for no reason at all.

I do have a few more good things to say about it, though. For one, the Hatbox Ghost’s backstory is told in this gorgeous, sepia toned animated sequence made to look like an old newsreel. As mentioned above, its contents don’t really stick, but its visuals did, especially since it’s the only notably good looking part of the film. The other standout piece was the “reverse seance” sequence, with Ben wandering through the halls of the mansion and encountering all house’s spirits and eventually finding the Hatbox Ghost. Effects wise, it’s not great. But the visual design and the ideas it plays with, such as the dueling ghosts shooting Ben and the connected paintings and the spirits leaving their paintings to run away from the Hatbox Ghost are a lot of fun.

As kids movies go, this isn’t one of the better ones. It’s alright, I guess. But there are so many other more meaningful and better ones out there. Even in theaters right now, you’ve got Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, which is superior in almost every way.

Haunted Mansion hasn’t been hailed as poorly as its predecessor, but it’s lining up to do even more poorly at the box office on a similar budget (accounting for inflation). Maybe with this rebuke, Disney will listen to the populace and stop this silliness?

…Nah, who am I kidding. Get ready for Space Mountain, Tower of Terror, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad!