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BOO!.......(hiss!) Since I have already seen the original,superior-by-a-mile 'Haunting' (1963) it's impossible for me not to compare it to this schlocky remake. Correction.....Actually 'it is' impossible to compare these 2 movies. It would be pretty much like comparing listening to a favourite piece of music played exactly the way I like to hear it to,say,listening to that same piece of music played by an incompetent band of musicians whose vocalist is tone-deaf and the instruments that they are playing on are all home-made jobs and totaly out of tune. It's true. There's no comparison. It can't be done. It's like trying to compare the state of absolute 'boredom'(this remake) to the state of sheer 'terror'(the original). And not only was terror very evident in the original,but the performances of the entire cast were exceptional,to say the least. From start to finish this remake deserves nothing but negative criticism. Even children's' movies like 'Casper' and 'Scoobie-Do' contain scenes of a more frightening nature than this snore-fest. And,believe me,Scoobie-Do is a far more convincing actor than any of these talentless boobs. The entire blame for this miserable excuse of a horror movie can't be placed solely on director,Jan de Bont's,shoulders,even though he did do a royal botch job here. On top of this,each actor,from Taylor to Neeson to Wilson to Zeta-Jones,are annoyingly pathetic,one and all. Since they are all so equally bad in their roles it's really difficult to narrow it down to the worst. Before I get into any personal criticism of these 4 actors,I wanna say that if any and/or all of them had had any 'real' talent at all then they would have been able to rescue this film from the dregs and,at least,turn it into an interesting interaction between the characters. But this never happened. Not even for a minute. In regards to Neeson and Taylor,they were both pretty much non-entities,easily disregarded. They were more 'ghosts' than the ghosts were themselves. And then there's Zeta-Jones and Wilson. Oh,brother,are these 2 lousy actors,or what!? In the original film the Zeta-Jones character,Cleo,was a classy,dignified,clairvoyant lesbian who had a disarming habit of speaking the truth,usually the brutal-truth. Claire Bloom handled the role beautifully. Zeta-Jones's Cleo is an obnoxious,flaky,promiscuous,clothes-horse,bi-sexual who says really stupid things to people and ogles everyone as if they were a piece of meat to be sexually devoured by her. And,yes,I realize that this could actually be a fascinating character if handled by a competent actress. But Zeta-Jones is so one-dimensional in her portrayal of Cleo that all you can do is despise her. Um....Ok....And now,last but not least,there's Mr. Owen Wilson.....Where the hell did this goof come from,I'd like to know!? How the frick did this twit with chronic nasal-congestion ever get to the position that he's in in Hollywood movies!!!??? I can't tolerate listening to this guy speak. Every-time he opens his mouth to talk I keep waiting for him to utter something worthwhile,but he never does. Never. And when he isn't talking thru' his nose he always keeps his mouth opened in the shape of an 'O',like he's sucking on air,or something. What a friggin' bozo! He's such a dreck that he can't even succeed in his own,real-life suicide. Sheesh! Is there no way to get rid of this guy??? Anyway,what this all amounts to is,if you want to see 'The Haunting' as it was meant to be,frightening,then check out the 1963 version. It holds up really well,even by today's standards. email this review to a friend
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