The Haunted Mansion Review

It's surprising that someone would think of the idea to create a movie around a theme park attraction, but I guess life is full of surprises.  The Haunted Mansion came out at about the same time as Pirates of the Caribbean had, what's next - Space Mountain: the Movie?  Actually, it;s even silier than that, it has been announced that the next Disney World attraction to become a major motion picture is The Jungle Cruise.  It sounds dumb and impossible, but stranger things have happened.

Having said that, The Haunted Mansion is not that far-fetched an idea.  The ride has it's own story and some of the tale has been translated into this film.  This is about a Louisiana man from the 19th century who threw a masquerade party to celebrate the fact that he would be asking the love of his life, Elizabeth for her hand in marriage.  His name is Master Gracey, and when he learns that Elizabeth had seemingly took her own life, in a pure Romeo & Juliet fashion, he takes his own life as well. 

The tremendous mansion now has a curse upon it, and all who have died and had been buried in the backyard cemetery are not allowed to cross the great divide and their ghosts are bound to the spacious grounds of the property of the manor. 

Years later in present day, it comes to the attention of the ghosts of Gracey Manor that there is a real estate agent who bares a striking resembles to Elizabeth, her name is Sara Evers.  She is one half of the real estate team of Evers & Evers.  The other Evers is her husband Jim Evers (played by Eddie Murphy).  They have two children, and they plan a weekend together as a family because they have been working so many hours apart.  Yet, they decide to take the consultation at Gracey Manor on their way out of town. 

When they arrive, the rain starts pouring down and they are forced to spend the night in the mansion, which little by little the Evers family begin to suspect is haunted.  They meet all of the regulars that you'd find in the ride, like Madame Leota, the Hitchhiking Ghosts, the Singing Busts and Master Gracey himself.  The night turns into a haunted adventure with plenty of laughs from Murphy and the humorous ghosts.

It's not the best Disney movie or the funniest Eddie Murphy film, but the film willentertain you surely.  There is a feeling of nostalgia for those who have ridden The Haunted Mansion attraction at either Disneyland or Walt Disney World, and a fun time for those who haven't as well. 

The Blu-Ray Difference

For those of you who are not too familiar with Blu-Ray discs, this is the next generation for DVDs. If you had finally purchased your HDTV and your DVD collection looks pale in comparison to your HD programming you get from cable or satellite, then Blu-Ray is here to remedy that situation. Blu-Ray discs are capable of holding a zillion times more data the DVD discs can which means uncompressed audio and video and the movie looks spectacular.

On Blu-Ray discs the bonus features aren't usually anything spectacular - but they're coming along slowly. On this disc they have some of the bonus features that are also available on the DVD version (presented in 1080i now) and two new features made for the Blu-Ray disc. The new features are here to show off the Blu-Ray capabilities and also to serve you another reason to purchase the Blu-Ray edition if you had already owned the DVD.

Blu-Scape - Grave Spiritsreplaces the DVD feature of "walking" through the movie set of the mansion by showing quick movie clips of the film. Here, you are moving through a real cemetery, and you are surrounded by an eerie soundtrack filled with creepy noises and ghastly voices in an uncompressed 5.1 and a crisp 1080p video.

History of the Haunted Mansionwas also featured in the DVD version. It's quite a journey that the attraction has come to get to fruition, and this short documentary takes you from sketches to models to Walt Disney himself showing what he thought would be in the ride. The video is presented in 1080i, although sometimes the vintage video still looks grainy sometimes.

Movie Showcase is an area where they highlight three video clips from the Haunted Mansion film to showcase the High-def audio and video capabilities. The scenes they choose are usually louder and a bit more colorful, and sometimes could spoil some aspects of the movie, so maybe it would wise to view after you have already seen the film. Again, this is presented in 1080p and uncompressed audio in 5.1.

Anatomy of a Scene: Ghosts in the Graveyard A behind the scenes look at the special effects of how they accomplished different ghostly scenes from the film. The video is presented in 1080i, and some of the darker scenes seem a little grainy at times as well.