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| Haunting, The |
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  (4/10)
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Runtime: 112 |
| Public Rating: 4.14 (7 votes) |
Director: Jan de Bont |
MPAA Rating:  |
| Genre: Horror/Thriller |
Year: 1999 |
| Writer(s): Shirley Jackson (novel), David Self |
| Reviewed by: Arturo García Lasca |
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After directiong both Speed films and Twister, director Jan de Bont decided to introduce some special effects in a totally different kind of genre he had never directed before, horror. Unfortunately, the movie wasn't scary enough and I believe that's the main reason why most people didn't like it.
Dr. David Marrow (Liam Neeson) is doing some studies on sleeping disorders, so he takes 3 people to a house that's supossed to be haunted to discuss each one's problems over there. Eleanor (Lili Taylor) isn't having the same kind of problems as 'Theo' (Catherine Zeta Jones Douglas) or Luke (Owen Wilson), she says she's able to sleep well but is awoken by her dead mother, who seems very real at those moments.
It all starts bad when Dr. Marrow's assistent gets her hand injured in a mysterious way, and in the very first night they start hearing strange sounds and voices. Eleanor is not awoken by her dead mother now, she's awoken by dead ghosts and voices of little children screaming for help. After this it all gets worse, things start moving by themselves and all sorts of accidents start happening, now the 4 people have to attemp to scape from the house, which is apparently trying to kill them all, but it wont be that easy.
The director De Bont tried to get some of those speciall effects seen in Twister to this film, and I must say the computer-based ghosts weren't so unreal. The special effects were pretty good, and the house looked very creepy, good job there. Acting was rather poor by most cast members, but in this kind of film it doesn't matter that much, so I don't complain about any performance. The story isn't bad, but I think it could have been much better; adding some more characters, a little bit more action and focusing more on the horror part could have helped. I thought it wasn't scary enough and at some points it was bored, I was tired of hearing the same non-scary voices all the time. I haven't seen the original version of this film (1963) but I bet for it's time it was better than this. I wouldn't recommend.
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