HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (1999)
Directed by William Malone
Starring Geoffrey Rush and Famke Jannsen
Fun, special effects-loaded haunted house film, based on the superior black-and-white camp classic with Vincent Price.
While not as fun as the Price original, this does deliver lots and lots of decent horror effects, and is definitely more interesting than "PG-13" haunted house flicks like "Poltergeist" and "The Haunting".
In this version of the story, the "House on Haunted Hill" is a former insane asylum run by a sadistic doctor. It`s now haunted by some kind of "evil" force. An amusement park mogul named "Price" (Rush)--who has a moustache like Vincent Price and seems to be partially fashioned after the personality of real-life master showman William Castle--will pay a group of guests $1 million apiece if they can survive the night there. The film attempts to make us wonder if the house isn`t really haunted (if Price isn`t up to his old tricks as a freak who loves frightening people), but of course the house is haunted.
Jansen is pretty forgettable as Price`s murderous wife and so are the rest of the actors. But it`s a fun flick. Best scene: A black ghostly gas chases characters throughout the building, killing anyone it comes into contact with. Genuinely scary. Catch it.