Product Details

• Actors: Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Owen Wilson, Lili Taylor, Bruce Dern
• Directors: Jan de Bont
• Writers: David Self, Shirley Jackson
• Producers: Jan de Bont, Colin Wilson, Donna Roth, Marty P. Ewing, Samuel Z. Arkoff
• Format: AC-3, Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Special Edition, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
• Subtitles: English
• Dubbed: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Studio: Dreamworks Video
• DVD Release Date: November 23, 1999
• Run Time: 113 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (413 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0783237413
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,444 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
  • #98 in Movies & TV > DVD > Horror
• Learn more about "The Haunting" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Suffering from the extreme bad luck of being released at the same time as the low-budget The Blair Witch Project, this adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House attempts to update Shirley Jackson's psychologically terrifying ghost story to the era of big-budget, computerized special effects. Does it work? Well, let's just say that showing isn't exactly the same as telling. A prime example of bloated studio filmmaking, The Haunting telegraphs all its frights so blatantly that it forsakes any of Jackson's subtle horrors for the remedial scares of a clunky carnival ride. The story remains basically the same, with four people called to an old mansion for experiments in the supernatural, but instead of getting inside the heads of its main characters (as the 1963 adaptation by Robert Wise did so well), Jan DeBont's film deserts character development for the huge, glorious set design provided by Eugenio Zanetti (Restoration). Thus, instead of a well-drawn story you get... a well-drawn house, one that four very talented and underutilized actors--Lili Taylor, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Liam Neeson, and Owen Wilson--wander around in endlessly (as Zeta-Jones puts it, the house is "sort of Charles Foster Kane meets the Munsters"). Taylor, as the hypersensitive Nell, is the unknowing lynchpin in the battle between good and bad ghosts and gets saddled with most of the expository dialogue of the mansion's gothic backstory. Zeta-Jones (showing some spark) and Neeson (showing none) are sadly reduced to providing reactionary shots of the film's disastrous climax, which mixes hapless new-age affirmations with computer-generated effects of ghosts and exploding windows, walls, doors, etc. For this haunted-house story, take a quick tour of the breathtaking rooms, but definitely don't stay the night. --Mark Englehart

Product Description

Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Lili Taylor. A supposedly haunted mansion lives up to its reputation when a scientist and three of his subjects elect to spend the night there. A terrifying remake of the 1963 classic. 1999/color/113 min/PG-13/widescreen.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 33 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Succeeds at a Ghost Story, Fails at Horror November 26, 1999

By Brian A. Wolters VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

When I saw the trailer for The Haunting, I was expecting the film to be a "thrill-a-minute scarefest." When I went to see it, I left the theater feeling pretty disappointed in not feeling scared (in fact, I walked right over and saw Blair Witch for a 2nd time.) Now that The Haunting is on video (DVD specifically,) I wanted to give it another chance. After a 2nd viewing, I felt it was a good "old fashion" ghost story, but it still failed at being scary. This movie is Lili Taylor's movie. Her portrayal of a sweet, hopeless romantic is very convincing. Everyone else in the cast is along for the ride. Owen Wilson has to be one of the worst actors around. I would cringe everytime he was on screen. The story about the hill house was good, if not a little vague at times. There are many good scenes that are slightly scary, but none of it is terrifying. Even though her acting was solid, where was a scene where Lili Taylor was smelling something that was pretty laughable. The good: special effects, sound effects, story, Lili Taylor (most of the time.) The bad: most of the acting, some horrible dialogue. All in all, I can recommend this film because it is fun, has very little graphic violence and next to no profanity. I give the Haunting a B-.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Be haunted or be entertained! January 17, 2005

By Everett

Format:DVD

Either way you're having a good time watching this movie. I was more entertained than haunted watching this movie, which is hard to do either way. Two simple facts that know you're making a right choice for this movie. #1: the acting is good, and in this movie, it has highly underrated stars such as Lili Taylor, and Catherine Zeta-Jones. #2: The plot makes sense, and entertains. It may seem like a bad choice at first, but once you watch it a second time, it really kicks in on your entertainment ratings.

Nell Vance (Lili Taylor) is a fairly simple woman neglected by her family, after her mother dies. When she has no where to go, she takes a roll in an experiment that Dr. Marrow (Liam Neeson) is doing for people with Insomnia, but it pays really good money. Taking a job where all you have to do is don't sleep; sounds pretty simple right? Something seems strange, yet interesting about the location where the experiment is being held, at the Hill House. Though it's strange that someone would abandon such a neat place, weird things seem to go on as the occupants get used to it. Theo (Catherine Zeta-Jones), and Nell hear rigorous banging sounds in their rooms through the night. Things get cold with an explanation, and out of no where, the Harpsichord tightens a string by itself, and snaps nearly cutting Dr. Marrows assisstants eye. What's even worse is that something is coming after Nell. She can hear voices in her room, but what are they trying to tell her? Maybe she got more of a job then she bargained for.

The acting in this movie was great, epecially by Lili Taylor. She was just great. She gives a kind of uneasy feeling about the house the way she potrayed her part as Nell. Catherine Zeta-Jones as Theo too.... Her and Owen Wilson as Luke added the comedy to the movie as the two modern gripers. All in all, not the kind of movie you'd expect. Some may not find it scary at all. I didn't really. I found it more of a great thriller. I actually found the trailer more terrifying.

Movies such as Ghost Ship and The Haunting are way too actiony to be scary. They do have their scary and haunting moments, but are really more of thrillers and suspensful than anything else. That's what's good about them, though. They come out trying to be something, and end up being something different, and in a lot better way than expected. Like I've been saying, one thing that really saved this movie was the acting. It's very rare any movie these days has any good acting, or else it's all overdone. By the star studded cast, you go in expecting something and get exactly what you desired from the cast. Love that Liam Neeson, and Lili Taylor. They are the best!

As for the affects, their better than a good many others in the nineties, and give you the illusion that they're not fake, but just barely. It's the plot that really grabs you, and Highclere Castle as the location was gorgeous. I fell in love with the set itself when it wasn't coming to life. And I must say, as an avid music lover, I can't help but notice the gorgeous music throughout the whole thing. It has it's ups and downs, but in the end, delivers well. Read more ›

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars As Subtle as a Really Big Stone Sculpture November 6, 2000

By Allie Kat

Format:DVD

This will be referred to as a classic horror in the years ahead....a classic horrible example of how Hollywood money can destroy a really good story-line. The plot, what there is of it, bears no resemblance to Shirley Jackson's psychological horror story. It's scraps of plots which make no sense, and dead-ends. There's lots of CGI and special effects, which no doubt were supposed to make up for the missing story. They don't. Nothing here is scary, unless you find the thought of dusting hilariously ugly wooden cherubs frightening.

The sets for the house were the best part, being completely bizarre and unreal and therefore worth seeing. Liam Neeson looks like he was blackmailed into taking the part, and Owen Wilson, with a fixed smirk rather like the afore-mentioned wooden cherubs, acts like he's in a comedy from the get-go. The women, Lili Taylor and Catherine Zeta-Jones, manage a little better considering the material they're given. Zeta-Jones certainly looks good, colorfully tarty and all that, but isn't given anything to do except wander around looking colorfully tarty. Bruce Dern and Marian Seldes look like they're having fun hamming it up in their roles as the caretakers, but they were probably just happy they had such small parts. This doesn't make it as a "good" bad movie, and it wouldn't really worth the trouble hating, except that it butchered a book that was both scary and intelligent.

34 of 44 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars The Surprise Comedy Hit of the Season! December 2, 1999

By A Customer

Format:DVD

"The Haunting" offers a textbook example of what happens when too much money is thrown at an ill-conceived project in the hopes that it will bear fruit. To terrify an audience, a good director needs no more than the ability to recognize and manipulate the power of the human imagination; the original "Haunting" or "The Blair Witch Project" come to mind. Jan de Bont, the director of this film, seems to have set out to make an aggressively mediocre movie: nothing, but NOTHING, is left to the imagination here. Every single supposed "fright" in the film is served up naked under a spotlight for us, leaving us with nothing but a collection of bland computer renderings. It was as if the advent of computer technology permitted the filmmakers to reveal all that was so cunningly suggested in the original with no thought as to the consequences. All psychological terror is expunged by the lack of faith in the intelligence of the audience. On the lighter side, the audience with whom I saw "The Haunting" had a grand time -- we recognized this contempt the filmmakers had for us and laughed from beginning to end. I never thought a decapitation by a huge stone lion's head flue could be funny...but films can always surprise you, can't they?