The House on Haunted Hill

Rating:
Summary: lame remake
Review: "House on Haunted Hill," though surely no worse than 1999's remake of "The Haunting," is, also, distressingly not much better. Itself a redux of a 1959 Vincent Price film, this modernization goes the usual route of adding buckets of blood and gore in a vain attempt to "update" material that is better left in its original form.

The film actually holds some promise in its early stages. Geoffrey Rush, in a marvelous display of scenery-chewing grandeur, stars as a thoroughly daft amusement park designer who decides to invite a group of people to his wife's birthday bash to be held at an old, abandoned insane asylum (a plot detail, by the way, that renders the film's title meaningless) that once functioned as the torture chamber for a mad scientist turned mass butcher. Of course, Rush has promised to give $1 million to whoever manages to survive the night. Unfortunately, though, once the cadre of handpicked nitwits is gathered within the secured confines of the haunted building, the film takes a decided turn downhill, settling into a standard slasher/haunted house film format replete with overwrought special effects, a limitless supply of gore and carnage, and endless shots of characters roaming along dark, flashlight-illuminated corridors, just waiting to be picked off one by one.

Despite the occasional nifty plot twist, the offbeat humor that informs the earlier sections of the film begins to drain away as Rush himself becomes more victim than prankster. That is a true shame because none of the other characters, with the possible exception of Rush's equally macabre and eccentric wife, evokes the slightest degree of interest or empathy from the audience. By the time heads are rolling and the house is methodically tracking each one down to be its next victim, we are ready to take the money and run ourselves.

Rating:
Summary: The Scariest Movie I Have Ever, Ever Seen!
Review: "The Blair Witch Project." "The Haunting." Let's face it. Today's horror films can really take on a terrible state. But then I saw "House on Haunted Hill..."

"House on Haunted Hill," starring Geoffrey Rush (Shine), Chris Kattan (SNL), and Taye Diggs (How Stella Got Her Groove Back) is an incredibly horrifying story about a 1930's psychotic doctor that works in a mental asylum. After performing a great number of awful and extremely gruesome experiments on the patients, the mental defectives "rebel" and murder the doctor and his staff in gory and graphic ways (the patients are then burned to death after the asylum is lit on fire and the lock system becomes effective. Only five patients make it out alive).

Almost seventy years later, the burned down asylum is given a good fix-up and turned into "an externally appealing mansion." Geoffrey Rush now owns the house, and offers five people the chance to spend the night in the haunted mansion. If they survive the night, they will be awarded with one million dollars. However, each person, one by one, discovers the evil lurking in the house, caused by the spirits of the dead doctors and mental patients, and survival suddenly becomes about 100 times more important than one million dollars.

I would definitely not recommend "House on Haunted Hill" to anyone with a weak stomach. The strong and intense scenes of blood and gore are constant. There isn't one scene without some act of violence, and gory results. I saw this film on Halloween, of all days, in the movie theatre. After an hour into the film, I literally found myself shoving away my popcorn. I felt sick to my stomach after seeing some of those scenes. The worst one is when a security guard gets his face "dug-out" by the evil spirit of the crazy doctor. Other incredibly disgusting scenes include one in which the five contestants are taking a tour through the house. They come across the basement (an area Geoffrey Rush didn't even know about), but they find no light. One of the contestants finds a lever, and pulls it out. The good news is the room suddenly becomes illuminated. The bad news is, the people find themselves surrounded not only by light, but by body parts, intestines, and bloody, as well as skinless corpses being preserved in glass tanks full of green water. The movie scared me pretty badly.

The movie offers a very effective beginning and ending, as well as a numerous amount of occurrences and elements that will make you jump about five feet off your seat. The movie also offers a great number of disturbing scenes containing footage of the psychotic doctor, his staff, and/or his patients (such as the beginning, in which the patients take over). Other disturbing scenes offer flashbacks that show some of the tortures practiced upon the mental patients. Some scenes were so bad, I found myself having to look at the floor. Hey, I told you the movie was gross.

The ending is where the computer graphics play their part. Although the "ghost-composed blob" at the end does look somewhat computerized, I still found THAT scary! I just found everything about this movie scary. I think the makers of this movie were expecting reactions similar to mine, so they put Kattan in the movie for humor and jokes. However, the jokes are ineffective in this movie. You don't find yourself laughing when watching this film. You just find yourself gagging.

After watching this movie, I found myself suffering from a number of symptoms, such as not being able to sleep without lights for the next two weeks, and loss of appetite. I also found myself quickly turning around and glancing behind me every chance I could. One thing's for sure. "House on Haunted Hill" sure changed the way I look at horror movies, and if you favor gore, and love to be scared, then rent this movie. Watching it will probably be the greatest experience of your life.

-Rated "R" for strong and constant scenes of bloody horror violence and gore, some language and nudity

Rating:
Summary: A Killer Party
Review: When a group of different people all are joined together to attend a party for a rich man's wife, all chaos breaks free when the ghosts of a pyschatritic asylum, the place where the party is being held, wrecks havoc on the guests. Around every corner horror and terror lurk, and together they must piece together the mystery of The House On Haunted Hill.


Now lets look at the violence in this movie. In one scene, a man turns a chair around and for a second we see a man's hollowed out head with jagged edges. The man who sees this screams and turns around in horror. We see a young woman lying on a bed thrashing about as she is electrucuted. People search around the room and find the off button, push it and the woman stops. As they remove the device attached to her head, blood pours out of her mouth. A man is stabbed in the gut repeatedly after trying to make sexual gestures to a woman. The man is later found in a room with his head removed and his body lying on the ground. Another man is shot repeatedly in the chest, but has a bullet proof vest on so he doesnt die. We see a woman hanging from the wall with her body parts removed and hung side by side. A woman is pulled into a bucket of blood and screams continuiously until a man comes and pulls her out. A man is stabbed in the neck with a bunch of pencils - we see the pencils pentrate the neck and burst out the other side - and blood sprays everywhere. Many people are burnt to a crisp and many people are killed. A man has shrink wrap tied around his head and is plunged into a tub of water. People are in an elevator and plunged downwards - they all scream in terror. Through a video camera, we see a womans hand flop onto the ground and is dragged off the screen, we hear lots of screams. A woman and a group of other men are in a room and notice fresh blood on the walls. We see a man lying on a bed trashing about as another man takes a scapel and makes a deep cut along his chest as blood spills out.


Now to the sexual side of the movie. There isn't that much sexuality or nudity - but there is some none the less. We see a woman's bare breast as she is hanging on a wall, one of them has been removed so there is only one. A woman is in a bath tub - no nudity is shown - only part of her bare legs. A man and woman kiss passionaetly in a few scenes. A womans threatens to hurt anyone if they look in upon her while she is bathing or is in her room. A woman tells a man she is going to shower than go to sleep.


Overall - this is a good remake of William Castles house on haunted hill starring vincent price. Not very scary - but a good horror flick to watch if and when you are bored.

Rating:
Summary: What Happened to the Mystery?
Review: In this version of THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL, a billionaire amusement park developer, Stephen Price (Geoffrey Rush) invites 5 separate people to spend the night at an old house/asylum with he and his wife, Mrs. Evelyn Stockard-Price (Famke Janssen). The Price's are having serious marital problems and Evelyn has a plan to frame her husband and steal most of his money. Price decides that a "slumber party" is what is needed and what better place to have some overnight guests than in a haunted house.

The opening scenes of the movie fill in the backdrop of the story, displaying how the "house" had at one time been used as an asylum where the doctor in charge performed innumerous crimes and experiments on the patients. The patients were somehow able to revolt, though and ended up destroying most of the place and burning everyone up inside including themselves. The place remained abandoned for years until an ambitious developer who had a history with the "house" purchased it in hopes of remodeling it into a spacious resort hotel (or something like it).

Back to the story present, Price invites 5 people to spend the night at the house and offers each of them a check for $1,000,000 if they can successfully stay the night. Price is more interested in living on a whim and getting his wife angry, but the 5 guests who show up with invitations aren't the guest that he invited. Nor or they guests that Mrs. Price had invited on an alternative guest list. Instead, none of the 5 individuals knows the other and none appear to know the Prices. The chills begin when a chandelier falls and ghosts are soon seen and things get out of hand even for Price.

THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL is a 1999 remake of the classic 1959 film by the same name that starred Vincent Price. Several changes were made in the plot from upping the ante to changing the house to an old asylum. However, the biggest change in the movie is the ending. The original THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL was promoted and marketed as a spooky movie, when it reality it was more of a mystery-movie than anything else. This version was marketed as a horror film and because of the cheesy ending remains that--instead of some interesting twist, it turns out that the house is actually a kind of living and breathing evil entity. Go figure. The more than supernatural ending ruined all the good things the movie had done up to that point. I think the film would have been better off if the ending was done more "realist" (maybe have had it actually turn out that there was a killer living in the asylum or something).

Overall, THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL is a decent suspenseful flick that if you can overlook the ending might actually be enjoyable. Kudos though to naming the head honcho in the film after the star of the original movie, Vincent Price.

Rating:
Summary: Oh, the horror!
Review: Quite a tedious movie I must say. For fans of horror this film fails to show anything truly scary. Chris Kattan displayed some terrific acting though. But the whole idea was it to be scary and it failed to do that for me.

Rating:
Summary: See the original - please
Review: Imagine if they took a Vincent Price film that was unpredictable and original, they stuck a bunch of annoying teenagers in it, and took out everything likeable about the original film. Oh wait...

Rating:
Summary: Not Bad 3.4/5
Review: This was a pretty good movie it starts off kinda lame and bloody but it got better so its good for renting.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent; Fun and A Great Scare
Review: This is just a good old-fashioned scare; the review that leaves me almost speechless is the, "how can dead people do..." various actions; if you can't suspend disbelief with a basic spook film like this, then you have no business watching a film meant for surreal entertainment.
Anyways, from start to finish the film is great, over the top, and plain, popcorn level, FUN. If you get a scare, and I think you will, then it does its job. Unless, of course, you think that some spook might steal your job :-)

Rating:
Summary: House On Haunted Hill (1999)
Review: William Castle's "House On Haunted Hill" was a favorite with most horror fans around the world. In 1999, director, William Malone, has given us his brilliant remake of the original 1959 cult classic.

Steven Price (played by Geoffrey Rush, portraying Vincent Price's role) is an amusement park tycoon. His wife, Evelyn Price (played by Famke Janssen, portraying Carol Ohmart's role), is getting ready to celebrate her birthday, where she informs Steven of having her party in the house on haunted hill. She tells him that she has left her guest list on his desk, but Steven secretly destorys Evelyn's guest list and whips up his own. But his computer is hacked into by an unseen force, deleting Steven's guest list and creating another. The newly created guest list has invited five guests. The first guest is Eddie Baker (played by Taye Diggs, portraying Richard Long's role), a former professional baseball player. The second is the beautiful Melissa Marr (played by Bridgette Wilson, portraying Julie Mitchum's role), a former T.V. show hostess, currently looking for a way to get back into the T.V. business. The third is Donald Blackburn (played by Peter Gallagher, portraying Alan Marshal's role), an MD, who has a few surprises of his own. The fourth is the beautiful, but innocent Sarah Wolfe (played by Ali Larter, portraing Carolyn Craig's role), an employee at Laythrone International Pictures. Sarah has shown up, claiming that her name is Jennifer Janzen. Jennifer Janzen is the woman who Sarah works for, as well as being the woman who was invited to the party, but Sarah has taken care of taking Jennifer's place. The last guest is Watson Prichard (played by Chris Kattan, portraying Elisha Cook's role), the terrified man who now owns the house.

Steven will be paying the guests $1,000,000 each, as long as they stay the night and are still alive the next morning. He reveals that if one of them dies, they lose and their checks made out to $1,000,000 will be divided up between those still amongst the living. The house is purely haunted, inhabited by the spirits of mental patients. The house was an institution that was called, "The Vannicut Psychiatric Institute For The Criminally Insane". Although, the house maybe inhabited by the spirits of Richard Vannicut's patients, the house is also inhabited by the spirit of the evil serial killer himself, Dr. Richard Vannicut. Our guests are arriving now. Let's see if you all can survive staying in a genuily haunted house for the second time in forty years. What will help you is by watching this amazing remake to the original 1959 cult classic.

Rating:
Summary: The House on Haunted Hill
Review: The House on Haunted Hill DVD ~ William Malone is a stupid but good horror movie that leaves little to the imagination as far as gore and blood. Even so, I love these kind of inane movies that are only meant to shock and entertain. The acting is sub par and the lines contrived and stupid. But this is what you want from these kind of movies so it should not be a suprise that it sounds like a talk show at times.