Everything from Disney’s The Haunted Mansion as a ride that’s in The Haunted Mansion as a movie is totally incongruous to the story.
About the only original element meant to be creepy is a gaping pit apparently leading to hell, which, at least the last time I checked, wasn’t part of the ride.
This summer’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl took inspiration from a similar Disneyland attraction but wove its own intriguing narrative. The Haunted Mansion is so beholden to the ride that its actors might as well be animatronic.
Oh, that’s too easy a knock on star Eddie Murphy. As best as can be expected anymore, he’s OK. But in a moment calling for concern, he’s so robotic you’ll be praying for him to start overacting.
Murphy is now as intent on playing an out-of-touch husband and father as he was at being the profane fish out of water in the 1980s. (Here, as a light reminder of his formally ribald self, he tosses the “a” word in.) Those who found his Daddy Day Care character too self-involved will really roll their eyes here.
He plays Jim Evers, the husband of a husband-and-wife real estate team. (Their motto, “We want you to be happy for evers and evers,” is funny because if they really existed, that would be their slogan.)
Jim is too hungry for a sale to let go of one on his anniversary. He also has long neglected his son (Marc John Jeffries) and daughter (Aree Davis). But, along with upset wife Sara (Marsha Thomason), he and the kids go off on a weekend vacation to solve their problems.
They’re sidetracked, though, by yet another possible big sale — Gracey Manor, a spooky swampland mansion with a laughably fake-looking backyard cemetery. The manor’s Lord Edward (Nathaniel Parker) is looking to sell, although there’s that odd circumstance of Sara being asked to come alone.
On their arrival, Jim abrasively takes over. He doesn’t know Edward is really a ghost who believes Sara is the reincarnation of his long-dead love who he wants to reclaim as his own. As Jim gets lost in the mansion, he and the children must uncover a secret from Edward’s past in order to save Sara.
Director Rob Minkoff establishes a spooky-enough mood with ghostly choirs on the soundtrack and plenty of lightning and rain onscreen. He also has an invaluable acting ally in Terence Stamp, cast as the white-as-a-sheet butler Ramsley.
His voice a perfection of inflection, Stamp makes his usually commanding tone faint and raspy here. A bit when he comments on a character’s crying as “tears of joy” before reverting to his usual scowl is a moment of genius.
While it’s nice that Minkoff doesn’t give in to the trend of loud, overblown family fantasies, his pace is way too laborious and stale.
There is one reasonably interesting twist, but Jim’s kids keep wondering when the “big family adventure” he has promised them will begin. By the hour mark, children might be asking their parents the same thing. In spots where the off-kilter energy of Beetlejuice or The Goonies would have been well-suited, The Haunted Mansion merely tries to impress the Disney suits.
Meant as comic relief, the ride’s hitchhiking ghosts show up for a pointless scene (and don’t even utter their eerie “We’ll see you again … soon” line). And the singing busts, turning every line of dialogue into four-part barbershop quartet harmony, are good for a slight chuckle, but similarly out of nowhere.
It’s not a complete wash, enjoyable in occasional stretches and boasting a fun performance from Stamp. But there’s disappointingly little in its 99 minutes that’s better than what the ride has been doing for years in 10.