My Rating: 4/5

Official Information:
Release Date: July 28, 2023
Box Office: 116.6 million (Box Office Mojo)¹
Rating: 6.1,10 (IMDb); 37% (Rotten Tomatoes)²
For What Audience: PG-13; Mainly pre-teen,teen audience
Cast: LaKeith Stanfield (Ben), Rosario Dawson (Gabbie), Tiffany Haddish (Harriet), Owen Wilson (Father Kent), Danny DeVito (Bruce Davis), Jared Leto (Alistair Crump)

Haunted Mansion, starring LaKeith Stanfield and Rosario Dawson, follows single mother Gabbie and her son Travis as they discover their new home is haunted. Astrophysicist Ben, spiritual medium Harriet, “priest” Kent, and history professor Bruce, all find themselves trapped by the ghosts, and they come face-to-face with the malevolent hatbox ghost who is on the verge of capturing his thousandth soul and unleashing his full power. As they work to free themselves, they must answer the question, “How can we defeat the hatbox ghost?”

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Haunted Mansion blends an emotional story of overcoming grief with an action-packed and humorous story about fighting spirits. Ben Matthias is introduced as an intelligent but socially awkward, scientist as he meets his to-be wife Alyssa in a flashback. As the movie jumps to the present day, his life takes a massive turn and he now works as a New Orleans tour guide, reluctantly dealing with superstitious visitors. Alyssa is absent (later revealed to have been killed in a car accident).

Later on, we meet single mother Gabby, a wealthy doctor moving into the haunted mansion with her, introverted, but kind, son Travis. After an encounter with malevolent spirits, Gabby reaches out to Father Kent, a so-called priest who refers the family to Ben. Ben finds his previous science experiment, a spectral camera for finding ghosts, but remains doubtful of the existence of the afterlife, having abandoned the project.

The film’s main action and conflict arise when Ben, Gabby, Travis, and Father Kent find themselves trapped in the mansion by the spirits. They enlist Harriet, a spiritual medium, and Bruce, a professor, who later becomes trapped as well. The group must find a way to free themselves without bringing the ghosts with them. But first, they need to discover what went so horribly wrong in the home so many decades ago.

As Haunted Mansion’s characters face their biggest challenge yet, they still deal with everything in a hilarious way, making the film enjoyable from start to finish. The end of the movie’s second act, however, reveals multiple treacherous backstories. We learn about Alyssa’s fate and discover the violent past of the home’s former owner: Alistair Crump. He’s the ever-powerful ghost tormenting the mansion’s residents and on the verge of capturing his thousandth soul. He’s targeting the weak, and Ben is his next target.

For being one of the longest Disney movies, Haunted Mansion’s 3rd act is surprisingly action-packed and features a tonal shift as the characters must fight for their life. The big twist about Travis is truly a shock, and his narrow rescue definitely keeps you on the edge of your seat. In the end, it takes everyone involved to beat the wretched Alistair Crump, and they don’t defeat him easily. The finale was a great payoff.

Though Alistair Crump was a tough villain, his writing and character design remained my biggest issue with the film. Some of the minor villains were far scarier than him, such as the ghost bride, who may be the closest thing to horror this movie has. His motives aren’t entirely clear either, which makes him slightly less intimidating to the audience.

Haunted Mansion is not really a horror movie, as none of the ghosts are truly scary, but it still features a few scares, mild violence, and some language. It’s rated PG-13 for fear and violence, and it is mainly aimed at teens,preteens, as well as families looking for a scary but not-too-scary Halloween film.

The finale left us with a few good questions: Do Ben, Harriet, Kent, and Bruce stay in the mansion? Can Alistair Crump come back? (If so, it would make for a great sequel!)

Overall, I thought the movie had a great, hilarious cast, and, despite having one of Disney’s longest runtimes, it maintains decent pacing. I appreciated how the humorous tone contrasted the parallel theme of overcoming grief, but the villain remains quite underwhelming in comparison to the story's more intriguing characters.