The Haunting (1999) – Review

In 1963 Robert Wise helmed an adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, which was a wonderfully executed psychological thriller with subtle horror aspects, flash forward to 1999 when Jan de Bont, the director of Twister, helmed a new take on the novel, one that didn’t bother with pesky little things like subtlety.

As was the case with the original story, this film centres around Eleanor Vance (Lili Taylor) a meek and mild-mannered woman who had spent the last eleven years caring for her invalid mother, who was rather demanding to the point of being a complete bitch, but now she is dead and Eleanor is about to lose her home due to the cruel machinations of her asshat sister (Virginia Madsen) and dickhead husband.  Then out of the blue, a phone alerts her to a money opportunity that could help solve her problems, so she quickly accepts an invitation to participate in an insomnia study that is being held by Dr. David Marrow (Liam Neeson) at the ominous Hill House. Unfortunately, the study Marrow is working on is not actually about insomnia, instead, his true purpose is to study the psychological response people have to fear and he intends to expose his subjects to terror to see how they will react in a given situation. Joining Eleanor on this rather dubiously ethical experiment is the bohemian bisexual Theo (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and goofball Luke Sanderson (Owen Wilson), who in the book was the heir to the estate but in this movie is just here to provide some comic relief. As the story unfolds this group will spend their fateful weekend in a mansion plagued by terrifying ghostly occurrences that are, at first, chalked up to group hysteria but soon a more sinister reason is revealed as the mystery of Hill House is exposed.

 

“Should we call the rest of the Scooby gang?

One of the most glaring issues with this adaptation is the departure from the source material, Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House, as well as Robert Wise’s 1963 adaptation, was a deep sense of psychological horror but that is not the case here.  In this adaptation, director Jan de Bont was more concerned with creating a thrill ride rather than a psychological thriller. Both the original novel and Wise’s adaptation focused on the unravelling of the characters’ sanity in a haunted house, relying on subtlety and the power of suggestion to terrify the audience, in contrast, Jan de Bont’s version abandons these subtleties in favour of a more overt CGI-driven approach, one that sacrifices atmosphere for spectacle. While this film boasts an impressive cast and visually stunning set design, the supernatural elements fall short of capturing the psychological depth and suspense of the source material.

 

This is more about visual eye candy than anything else

The characters in this adaptation also suffer from one-dimensional development and their cliche-ridden dialogue isn’t something even this talented cast could overcome. The characters on display here never transcend their stereotypical roles, such as the fragile troubled heroine, the sexually fluid beauty and the comic relief, respectively. There’s little to invest emotionally in this group and the relationships between these characters feel forced and underdeveloped. As our protagonists wander down dark and foreboding passageways it becomes apparent that the film is more about the gorgeous and creepy setting rather than the people within. The elaborate special effects and CGI used to bring the supernatural occurrences to life often overpower the story’s subtlety and the plot into a Haunted House thrill ride.  It should also be noted that the one thing that dates the film is the look of the 90s-era computer animation, while the statues that come to life look fine the ghostly images of the murdered children look like a cross between Casper the Friendly Ghost and soap bubbles.

 

“Let’s keep it dark, really dark so no one can see how bad the CGI effects are.”

Stray Observations:

• Eleanor’s sister and brother-in-law are so cartoonishly rotten, to the point that I half expected the ghosts from the Hill House to eventually hunt them down.
• If the housekeeper of a creepy mansion told me “We live in town, nine miles away, so there won’t be anyone around if you need help. We couldn’t even hear you in the night. No one could. No one lives any nearer than town. No one will come any nearer than that, in the night, in the dark.” I’d have packed my bags and left immediately.
• Hill House was built by a 19th-century textile tycoon in the hope of populating it with a large family, but why it is full of architectural optical illusions, hidden passageways, mirrored hallways and a carousel room is beyond me. It’s more a Walt Disney attraction than a home.
• On the first night Marrow’s assistant is injured by the malevolent forces of Hill House and she is taken to the hospital by another of Marrow’s group, but even though they are told “Hey, I want you guys back as soon as possible” we never hear from them again. Did both of them decide “Fuck it, we’re not going back to that spook show.”
• On the second night Eleanor wakes up and follows ghostly voices and tiny bloody footprints that mysteriously appear on the floor to a hidden room. This is after they had just discovered “Welcome Home Eleanor” written in blood on Hugh Crane’s portrait, yet she’s still up to following ghosts through the halls of this spooky-ass mansion? It’s at this point that I lost all sympathy for her character.
• Hugh Crane was clearly an evil man, abducting and murdering children, but would he have commissioned a portrait that looked like something you’d find in Dorian Gray’s attic? Did he ask the artist “Can you make me look like a nightmare in the flesh?”

 

I’d say this art style was a little on the nose.

Without a doubt, the one aspect of this film we can all agree on is that the production design was great, with Hill House working as a character in itself and its Gothic architecture, creepy statuary and eerie interior lighting providing a chilling backdrop to the unfolding events of this story. If only the story was worthy of it. And to be fair, Jan de Bont’s The Haunting does sport some nice practical effects and the art direction was simply fantastic, not to mention the set decoration by Cindy Carr which elevated the entire production to a whole new level, making Hill House a character in and of itself. Say what you will about the bad CGI and cheap jump scares this film has killer production values and makes you want to wander these amazing halls and rooms.

 

Book your tour now, the only cost is your soul.

But good art direction can only get you so far, and this adaptation was hobbled by a script that sometimes veered into melodrama, with characters reacting predictably to supernatural events while lacking the depth and nuance of Shirley Jackson’s original novel or Robert Wise’s 1963 adaptation. The reliance on jump scares and loud sound effects also diminished the psychological horror elements that made the original novel so captivating and the pacing also feels uneven, with a slow start and a rushed climax that leaves many questions unanswered. Despite these flaws, Jan de Bont’s re-imagining does manage to pull off a few moments of genuine terror and intrigue, and if you’re a fan of haunted house tales and can overlook the film’s narrative shortcomings, The Haunting may provide an entertaining, albeit somewhat superficial, horror experience.
 

In the end, The Haunting is a visually appealing but ultimately poor adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s classic ghost story, one that is overshadowed by its inability to capture the psychological depth and subtlety of the source material. It may be worth a watch for horror enthusiasts, but it doesn’t quite live up to the legacy of its literary inspiration.