The Haunted Mansion (film)



The Haunted Mansion is one of Disney's ventures in adapting their theme park attractions into movies, directed by Rob Minkoff. It was theatrically released in November 2003 and wasn't quite as successful at the box office as the first Pirates of the Caribbean film, which was also released in 2003.

Workaholic realtor Jim Evers (played by Eddie Murphy) and his family -- wife Sara, son Michael and daughter Megan -- are invited to the old and haunted Gracey Manor outside of New Orleans. Things take a sinister turn when the family learns that the ghostly owner, Master Edward Gracey (Nathaniel Parker) and his butler Ramsley (Terence Stamp), both believe Sara to be the reincarnation of Gracey's long-lost fiance Elizabeth and that she will be the key to lifting the curse on the house that keeps the 999 souls from passing onto the next world. With the help of Madame Leota (Jennifer Tilly) and a few ghostly servants, Jim and his kids must uncover the truth behind what really happened to Elizabeth, encountering the many ghosts of the graveyard, zombies, haunted suits of armor and the gates of Hell themselves opening.

The film is extremely polarizing. Fans of the ride hate its guts because it decides to focus on the antics of Eddie Murphy and de-emphasize some of the ride's more notable elements. Several critics also hate the film's guts for Eddie Murphy's childish antics. It earned a 13% approval rating amongst critics at Rotten Tomatoes. For good measure, the bulk of people outside the target demographic hate the film's guts. But the movie apparently has its fans, and kids seem to love the film, plus it's a lot easier to watch if you DVD Skip everything between the opening credits and when the family arrives at the house.

The bright spots are the gorgeous set designs, ride-based Mythology Gags, and the soundtrack music, which pays a nice tribute to Buddy Baker and Grim Grinning Ghosts. Unfortunately, it was never independently released to the masses. What they released to the masses instead was The Haunted Mansion - Haunted Hits, which consisted of one soundtrack song, several horrifying remixes of 1980s pop horror songs by unknown artists, and an equally horrifying remix of "Grim Grinning Ghosts" by Barenaked Ladies. Only a few incredibly rare copies of the true soundtrack exist -- they were used to submit it for a movie award nomination, they were auctioned for a final bidding price of $500, and they subsequently became highly sought after memorabilia.

Disney has recently announced that they are going to be taking another whack at a Haunted Mansion movie, to be headed by Guillermo del Toro.

This film contains examples of...

 * Adaptation Expansion: Given that, contrary to Word of Dante, there is no real Backstory to the original ride, this was inevitable.
 * Are We There Yet?
 * Ascended Fanon: The idea of Master Gracey being the Ghost Host's true identity was always a fan-based idea.
 * Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: The ghosts at the end
 * Avoid the Dreaded G Rating: probably the reason the Big Bad says "Damn you all to Hell" at the climax.
 * Batman Gambit: Ramsely's Evil Plan depends on two fault points; the first is convincing Sara to pretend to be Elizabeth and banking on Edward not noticing the difference.
 * Back From the Dead
 * Big Damn Heroes
 * Big Fancy House
 * Book Ends: The "Welcome, Foolish Mortals" and Madame Leota's "Be sure to bring your...death certificate" Stinger echo the ride.
 * The Butler Did It:
 * Car Fu
 * Character Development
 * Cordon Bleugh Chef / Foreign Queasine: What the butler serves the trespassing family.
 * Dead Ex Machina
 * Defanged Horrors: Including some serious Nightmare Fuel, like Eddie Murphy's face rotting in a mirror.
 * Dem Bones: Many of the zombies.
 * Developing Doomed Characters
 * Did Not Do the Research: A particularly embarrassing one on the part of Disney; the singing busts first appear singing "Grim Grinning Ghosts", with the lyrics "When the crypt doors creak and the tombstones quake." On the DVD, however, the subtitles are given as "When the cryptos creak." Geez, laweeze, you'd think that they'd get the lyrics to their own ride right.
 * Disney Death
 * Dragged Off to Hell:
 * Driven to Suicide
 * Earn Your Happy Ending
 * Everything's Better with Sparkles: The ghosts are designed to look like they are covered with reflective glass beads.
 * Evil Plan: Ramsely wants to lift the curse and though this means everyone is freed he is remarkably callous to the other ghosts and will go to any means to succeed.
 * Fate Worse Than Death
 * Fire and Brimstone Hell
 * Flash Back
 * Ghost Butler: Ramsley
 * Ghostly Goals
 * Glowing Eyes of Doom:
 * Happily Ever After
 * Haunted House
 * Hey, It's That Guy!: General Zod is Ramsley.
 * I Did What I Had to Do
 * Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Jim
 * Kick the Dog
 * Large Ham
 * Malevolent Architecture: The mansion is deliberately designed to look like a tomb, with cemetery-style statuary. It might have been nice once, but It Got Worse after becoming haunted.
 * Maligned Mixed Marriage:
 * My Grandson, Myself
 * Mythology Gag: Tons of them. And even outside Mansion-based ones, the tiki bar Jim goes to towards the beginning is a nod to the Enchanted Tiki Room.
 * The Enchanted Tiki Room which, at Disneyland, you must walk by to get to the Haunted Mansion ride.
 * Ominous Music Box Tune
 * Ominous Pipe Organ
 * Oracular Head: Madame Leota, as in the ride. In order to keep Jennifer Tilly's head perfectly still, she had to be bolted into a device like a surgical halo.
 * Our Ghosts Are Different
 * Politically-Correct History: Averted,.
 * Portrait Painting Peephole
 * Recycled in Space: It's Evil Dead II...as a kids' movie!
 * Rhymes on a Dime: Madame Leota, as in the ride.
 * Rousing Speech
 * Scenery Porn
 * Shout-Out: In the prologue, Gracey and his fiancee are hosting a fancy dress ball and he's wearing a blue jacket with gold trim while she's wearing gold ballgown with her hair done up.
 * Smart People Know Latin: Megan is supposed to be the smartest character and is taking a Latin course.
 * Stalker with a Crush:
 * Tarot Motifs
 * Unfinished Business
 * Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Michael's fear of spiders.