The Haunted Mansion (2003)

“Wait a minute. You're telling me this guy is dead, and the only reason we were brought here is he wants to get jiggy with my wife?” – Jim Evers

It’s been a pretty hectic and full-on Shocktober this year, so before we head off into the final four, I thought we could ease up a little on the throttle, take our collective breath and kick back with a lighter toned movie. As it’s the twentieth anniversary of this particular movie, why not?

The Haunted Mansion is my all-time favourite ride at both Disney parks in Orlando and Paris. Any spare time I have during a visit, I’m not hard to find – I’m riding The Haunted Mansion repeatedly. (Or, in Paris, The Phantom Manor.) It’s a ghost ride obviously, with a pretty grim tale of despair and suicide, but told in a family friendly, fun way. The scares aren’t too intense - but the magic is in the technical expertise used to tell the story and create the required atmosphere. On a hot Florida day, that ride will convince you you’re riding through a haunted house and a graveyard at night. Pure Disney magic, and having ridden it with my kids when they were small, the safe knowledge that Uncle Walt wouldn’t traumatise or shock them – but we’d have a great time.

Having enjoyed success with Pirates of the Caribbean (my second favourite Disney attraction and another I’m happy to ride repeatedly) earlier in 2003, it was no surprise that the House of Mouse would have another ride-based movie ready for release. Both rides tell a story, but the story is told in 7-10 minutes you’re on the ride. There’s not really enough there to sustain a feature film, so the trick is to retain enough elements from the ride to make it a familiar nostalgia trip for those in the know, but not to include those elements so intrusively as to alienate those who’ve never been to a Disney Park. It’s a finely tuned balancing act.

With that in mind, what we have here is essentially an Eddie Murphy vehicle, set in the classic Haunted Mansion with several elements from the ride, including the background story of the bride.

As the titles roll, we catch up quickly on past events where in around 1855 a wealthy Louisiana nobleman named Edward Gracey (Nathaniel Parker) has fallen in love with Elizabeth Henshaw. One night, she writes Gracey a letter and commits suicide. In complete despair, Gracey hangs himself that same night. (This is basically the story of the ride – but there are slightly different versions in each park.)

In the present day, realtor (or, if you’re in the U.K. - estate agent) Sara Evers, wife and business partner of Jim Evers of Evers and Evers receives a mysterious call from a stiffly British person, summoning her to a Louisiana mansion that’s coming on the market. The mysterious caller is Ramsley, the butler (Terence Stamp).

There’s a lot of wise cracking from Eddie Murphy in the role of Jim Evers as the plot unfolds. But the more you look at the plot, the darker it gets Obviously, the Evers family don’t know they’re dealing with ghosts as they meet both Ramsley and Gracey. A rainstorm hits, flooding the roads, so the Evers family are stuck in the mansion for the night.

It’s revealed that Sara is the exact image of the late Elizabeth Henshaw, Gracey’s love for her was disapproved of by Ramsley who murdered her, and swapped the letter she wrote, professing her love for Gracey with one of his own, which drove his master to suicide. And as he ended his own life, he’s now unable to enter the afterlife.

Okay – let’s just pause there and unpack this.

The clear implication here, though never overtly said out loud, but it’s certainly there, is that Ramsley believed he was doing his best to “protect” his master against making a foolish decision in marrying Elizabeth – because although she was of middle class she was of mixed race, and therefore in Ramsley’s words “unacceptable”. So, he killed her. The reason he’s now actively trying to reunite the lovers, believing that Sara is the reincarnation of Elizabeth is that along with Gracey, all those in the household are cursed as ghosts, unable to move on until Gracey and Elizabth are back together. His motives are selfish.

Despite that dark and heavy plotline, the film still manages to be a fairly upbeat horror comedy that’s safe to watch with children. Yes, there’s a mausoleum scene where the dead start emerging from their coffins in various states of decay, but it can’t be a horror comedy without a little bit of horror among the comedy. Personally, my favourite scene in the film is the ride through the graveyard where we see many of the ghosts or happy haunts as they’re called in the parks, that we see on the ride.

Oddly, this is one of a handful of films that I didn’t much care for the first time I saw it, but over the years my indifference has faded and I like it more on each subsequent viewing.

There is another version The Haunted Mansion that was released earlier this year, of course – and I covered that here.

So, we’ve had a brief respite. Next time, we go straight for the gore and the psychotic.

See you there.