'Haunted Mansion' Review: A Disney Ride to Nowhere Fun – The New York Times

There’s a mansion, it’s haunted, boo, blah, the top.

That’s just about all there’s to say about “Haunted Mansion,” a live-action branding alternative from Disney “impressed by” its theme-park attraction of the identical title. The primary of those opened in 1969 in Disneyland, in Anaheim, Calif., the place it’s within the “Music-Lovin’ New Orleans Sq.,” because the park’s web site places it. That’s the location of one other fan favourite, the Pirates of the Caribbean journey, which spawned a multibillion-dollar movie franchise for Disney. “Haunted Mansion” is unlikely to do the identical.

That is the second function primarily based on the “Mansion” attraction. (A 2021 Halloween particular, “Muppet Haunted Mansion,” is streaming on Disney+.) The primary movie, “The Haunted Mansion” (2003), starring Eddie Murphy, was extensively panned however made hundreds of thousands. In his assessment, the New York Instances critic Elvis Mitchell wrote that it was “solely a matter of time earlier than “‘Parking Lot: The Film’ and ‘Folks-Mover: The Movement Image,’” an commentary that feels extra true and fewer humorous now that this 12 months has introduced us different I.P.-based branding alternatives about all types of stuff, together with sneakers (“Air”), video games (“Tetris,” “The Tremendous Mario Bros. Film”), junk meals (“Flamin’ Sizzling”) and, after all, a doll (a.ok.a. “Barbie”).

The brand new “Haunted Mansion” was directed by Justin Simien, whose first function, “Pricey White Folks” (2014), is an incisive, sharply humorous satire a couple of political firestorm at a school that earned him plenty of consideration and led to each a ebook and a well-received Netflix present of the identical title. I hope that Disney paid Simien truckloads of cash to direct “Haunted Mansion,” and that he had extra enjoyable making it than I had watching it. He retains issues shifting alongside, kind of, and the interesting forged hit their marks, nevertheless it’s dispiriting to see him directing what’s successfully a feature-length Disney promotion. I hope it’s his final big-studio advert.

It stars LaKeith Stanfield (“Atlanta”), who imbues his generic function — a brainiac with a tragic story and busy tear ducts — with extra emotional depth than the film requires, which is its solely shock. His character, Ben, has developed a digicam that may take pictures of ghosts, gear that you simply’d count on the paranormal investigators within the (non-Disney) Ghostbusters sequence to have. And, wouldn’t it, the screenwriter right here, Katie Dippold, additionally co-wrote the female-led “Ghostbusters” (2016) reboot. Like that film, “Haunted Mansion” contains a ragtag group of likable eccentrics battling digital ghosts, nevertheless it’s fright-free and much much less humorous. It’s all setup and no payoff.

The forged contains Rosario Dawson, whose unwaveringly mounted smile means that she determined to simply grin and bear it to play Gabbie, a single mom with a predictably cute moppet, Travis (Chase W. Dillon). Gabbie desires to open a bed-and-breakfast within the mansion, which she discovered on Zillow, one in every of a lot of product manufacturers invoked all through the film. (For a cross-promotion stunt, the mansion has been listed on Zillow in the actual world.) Additionally onboard is an oddball priest (Owen Wilson), a ditsy medium (Tiffany Haddish) and an excitable scholar (Danny DeVito). Jamie Lee Curtis pops in, too, for a flip that made me need to rewatch her genuinely scary efficiency in “The Bear,” a present on the Disney-owned streamer Hulu. I’d watch Curtis in absolutely anything, together with “Parking Lot: The Film,” which I assume is already in improvement.

Haunted Mansion
Rated PG-13 for very delicate ghost motion. Working time: 2 hours 2 minutes. In theaters.