The Haunting (1999 film)
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| The Haunting | |
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 The Haunting film poster |
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| Directed by | Jan de Bont |
| Produced by | Donna Roth, Colin Wilson |
| Written by | Novel: Shirley Jackson Screenplay: David Self Uncredited: Michael Tolkin |
| Starring | Lili Taylor, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Owen Wilson, Liam Neeson |
| Music by | Jerry Goldsmith |
| Distributed by | DreamWorks |
| Release date(s) |  July 20, 1999 October 1, 1999 |
| Running time | 113 minutes |
| Language | English |
| Budget | ~ US$80,000,000 |
| Gross revenue | $177,311,151 |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
The Haunting is a 1999 remake of the 1963 horror film of the same name. Both films are based on the novel The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, published in 1959. The Haunting was directed by Jan de Bont and released in the United States on July 20, 1999, and in Thailand on October 1, 1999.
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[edit] Synopsis
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When her invalid mother dies, Eleanor "Nell" Vance (Taylor) joins an insomnia study run by Dr. David Marrow (Liam Neeson) at Hill House - a secluded manor in Massachusetts. Upon arrival, Eleanor meets two other participants, Theo (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and Luke (Owen Wilson).
Unknown to the participants, Dr. Marrow's true purpose is to study the psychological response to fear. Each night, the caretakers chain the gate outside Hill House, preventing anyone from getting in or out until morning, when the caretakers open the lock. There are no working telephones inside Hill House and cell phone service is unavailable there. The house was chosen because of its isolation from the outside world.
On their first night at the mansion, Dr. Marrow relates the legend of Hugh Crane - an Industrial Revolution tycoon who built Hill House. According to Marrow's telling of the legend, Crane's wife killed herself before the house was finished, which drove Crane insane. As he tells the story, an accident causes Marrow's research assistants to leave the house, leaving the doctor alone with the study participants for the duration of the study.
The first night, Theo and Eleanor begin to experience strange phenomenon within the house, including strange noises, inexplicable temperature changes. Dr. Marrow placates Theo with explanations centered around the old house's plumbing, but Eleanor remains unconvinced. Her experiences intensify. Eventually, she sees apparitions, but everyone else in the house believes that she's making up stories for attention. Eleanor is confronted after the main hallway is vandalized with the words "Welcome Home Ele anor", and becomes extremely distraught, setting out to prove that the house is haunted by the souls of those victimized by Crane's cruelty. She learns that Crane built his fortune by exploiting kidnapped children for slave labor and murdering them when they were of no more use to him. She also learns that Crane had a second wife named Carolyn, to whom Eleanor is distantly related.
Theo learns the dual nature of Marrow's study and convinces both Marrow and Luke that the pressures of being confined to the house are causing Eleanor to suffer a nervous breakdown. They agree to leave Hill House, but they are unable to break open the lock on the gate. They decide to go back inside and wait for morning, but once they return to the house, a series of paranormal activities sets into motion a confrontation between Eleanor and the spirits inhabiting the house. Various stone carvings become supernaturally animated and attack the four, chasing them through the mansion's many rooms, ultimately leading to Luke's death.
Realizing that she must avenge the souls of Crane's victims, Eleanor invokes Crane's spirit to manifest and is able to lead him towards a huge iron door with the inscription "All Ye Who Stand Before These Doors Shall Be Judged" engraved on it. An avenging wind howls throughout the room and demons from the gates of hell pull Crane's spirit into hell. Eleanor is thrown into the door and dies with her arms outstretched as a Christ figure, while her spirit floats from her body and rises up to heaven with the spirits of Crane's victims. After witnessing Eleanor's death, Theo and Marrow wait by the gate outside to be let out of Hill House.
[edit] Trivia
- This film was originally to have been a collaboration between Steven Spielberg (mainly, as director) and Stephen King (as screenwriter), but the two had creative differences and went their own way. King instead wrote the teleplay for Rose Red, a television miniseries that shares many elements with Jackson's source novel The Haunting of Hill House, and the character of the real-life edifice Winchester Mystery House, in San Jose, California.
- Argentine production designer Eugenio Zanetti oversaw the set designs. Zanetti also worked on Restoration (1995) and What Dreams May Come (1998).
- The film was spoofed in Scary Movie 2.
- The Harlaxton Manor, in England, was used as the exterior of the house, while many of the interior sets were built inside the dome-shaped hangar that once housed The Spruce Goose, near the permanently docked RMS Queen Mary steamship, in Long Beach, California.
- In Jackson's source novel, the Luke Sanderson character (played here by Owen Wilson) survives his stay at Hill House. Also, the novel's Eleanor dies in suicide when her car crashes headlong into a tree just outside the House.
[edit] Cast
- Lili Taylor – Eleanor 'Nell' Vance
- Liam Neeson – Dr. David Marrow
- Catherine Zeta-Jones – Theo
- Owen Wilson – Luke Sanderson
- Marian Seldes – Mrs. Dudley
- Bruce Dern – Mr. Dudley
- Alix Koromzay – Mary Lambetta
- Todd Field – Todd Hackett
- Virginia Madsen – Jane Vance
