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House on Haunted Hill is a 1999 horror film, directed by William Malone and starring Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Taye Diggs, Ali Larter and Jeffrey Combs. It also includes a cameo appearance by Peter Graves. Produced by Robert Zemeckis and Joel Silver, it is a remake of the 1959 film of the same name directed by William Castle, borrowing elements from the 1973 classic Don't Look in the Basement. House on Haunted Hill marks the producing debut of Dark Castle Entertainment, a production company that went on to produce Thir13en Ghosts and House of Wax, two films which were also remakes of William Castle's films. The film is often compared with The Haunting[who?], another 1999 remake of a similar film from 1963, based on the novel The Haunting of Hill House. Also worth noting, in comparison to the original, while William Castle's version leaves a degree of ambiguity as to the presence of ghosts in the building, the remake leaves no doubt whatsoever. The film was followed by a sequel, Return to House on Haunted Hill, which was released in both rated and unrated editions on DVD in 2007.
PlotThe film is set in an abandoned asylum, the Vannacutt Psychiatric Institute for the Criminally Insane, where numerous murders were committed in the past. The head of the facility, Dr. Richard B. Vannacutt (Jeffrey Combs), performed grotesque experiments and medical procedures on the patients, killing many in the process. The hospital was closed when some of the so-called "patients" escaped, killing almost the entire staff and burning the hospital. Vannacutt had rigged the building with numerous iron gates, activated by cranks and levers, to serve as barriers to keep patients from leaving the building, should they escape; some of these were controlled by huge, clock-like timers that wouldn't open for twelve hours. During the fire, he released these gates, keeping the inmates, employees and the fire itself contained. After several unexplained deaths during reconstruction of the facility, it was dubbed "The House on Haunted Hill." The story revolves around the disintegrating marriage of Evelyn (Famke Janssen), a spoiled trophy wife who is the epitome of term "high-maintenance", and Steven Price (Geoffrey Rush), an amusement park mogul with a wicked sense of humor, each of whom would gladly and cheerfully kill the other. Evelyn fancies spectacular parties, so Steven leases the house from the owner, Watson Pritchett (Chris Kattan), for his Halloween birthday bash. Steven is given a guest list two pages long by Evelyn; which he shreds to spite her and then creates one of his own. The five people who show up for the party--Jennifer Jenzen (aka Sara Wolfe) (Ali Larter), Eddie Baker (Taye Diggs), Melissa Margaret Marr (Bridgette Wilson), Dr. Donald Blackburn (Peter Gallagher) and Pritchett himself--aren't the ones he invited. Neither Evelyn nor Steven know who they are. Despite this, Price continues the party's theme, offering a million dollars to anyone who stays in the house and survives until morning, with any person not making it having his money added to the pot. Shortly afterward, the security gates are tripped, locking everyone inside and forcing them to remain there until the gates unlock in the morning. Price scolds Carl Schecter (Max Perlich)--a company employee, who has developed a series of harmless traps to scare the guests--for not letting him know he planned to pull a stunt like that. Schecter said it wasn't him who did it. Price is then convinced his wife did it somehow. Things quickly escalate beyond a few harmless scares. What follows is the slow- and often bloody- demise of several of the guests and hosts in various ways, courtesy of the evil spirits that reside in the house. It's revealed that the spirits themselves created the guest list specifically to include the descendants of five members of Vannacutt's staff who didn't die in the long-ago fire. After a deranged Steven attempts to kill Evelyn for orchestrating his murder plot, the two accidentally unleash the Darkness of the house when he throws her through an ancient and decayed door. The Darkness is a dark, shape-shifting creature comprised of all the spirits in the house, led by Dr. Vannacutt; this force comes after and tries to kill all the remaining guests, thereby trapping them in a permanent purgatory in the house. It starts by assimilating Evelyn into itself, killing her while Price watches in horror. The Darkness reveals how the evil souls that comprise it want to feed on all those "who are responsible." Upstairs, Pritchett, Eddie and Sara are trying to open one of the iron gates on the windows when they hear Price's screams from down the hall. Pritchett investigates, while the Darkness catches up with Price on the other side of the door; he jumps out of the way at moment when Pritchett opens the door and the Darkness assimilates him and flows away. Price runs through the hall while Sara and Eddie follow, trying to figure out how he's alive when Sara supposedly shot him (answer: a bullet-proof vest). Price tells them that what Pritchett's been saying all along is true: the house is alive and killed everyone (except Dr. Blackburn, murdered by Evelyn and his head cut off to frame Price). He figures that the only way to get out is to go to the attic and activate the pulleys that sealed off escape from the house. Price runs ahead of them to activate them while Sara and Eddie stay behind. The Darkness seeps through the house and tries to use it to kill them. As they are running up the stairs to the attic Sara trips, and the Darkness uses Melissa's form to try to lure her to it. Price by then has activated a pulley that reveals an opening in the window of the attic. Eddie and Sara get there, while the Darkness seeps up the cracks of the wooden floor, and Sara lingers while Eddie goes to the opening. Eddie looks back from the window to find that the Darkness had arrived and is attempting to sever the rope that keeps the iron gate open. While Eddie rushes back to get Sara, the Darkness tries to assimilate her but instead assimilates Price, who had sacrificed his life to get Sara out of the way. Sara escapes just as the iron gate comes crashing down, trapping Eddie with the Darkness. The Darkness then confronts Eddie and brings up charges against his ancestor's actions. Eddie then screams that he was actually adopted. At the sound of this, Pritchet's ghost appears (separate from the Darkness; which means the Darkness only killed him, but didn't assimilated him) and frees Eddie by pulling the rope needed to open the iron gate, at which Sara pulls Eddie through as the Darkness is about to assimilate him. After he is pulled through, the gate shuts, Pritchet's ghost disappears and the Darkness disappears into nothingness. As Sara and Eddie sit in exhaustion over the night's events, they notice that an envelope has been pushed through the gate, containing five checks for $1 million each. After the credits, a film is shown with the patients operating on Evelyn and Price's dead bodies. Cast
Deleted scenesA scene that was deleted and not shown on the DVD was of Sara and Eddie being saved by the Coast Guard at the end of the movie. It was cut because director William Malone believed it didn't fit in with the movie and didn't suit the ending. There were also a couple of scenes in the trailer that were not shown in the movie or on the DVD. On the DVD release of the film were 3 deleted scenes: Sara Gets the InviteThis scene explains how Sara got the invitation and why she pretended to be someone else at the party. There are two versions of this scene on the DVD. One that takes place in Pasadena, California on a street in front of a house, and another that takes place in a field located by the studio where the movie was filmed. In version one, Sara plays the assistant to Jennifer Jenzen, the rude, foul mouthed executive V.P. of Lathrup International Pictures. While on the set of a movie, she interrupts the shooting by yelling at the director, forcing him to cut. She then gets a crane operated box that gives her a finger cut when she ignores the warning on the box and rotates a wheel that opens it up. Sara laughs and is fired. For severance pay, Jennifer gives the box to Sara. She then notices the invitation to the party, but fails to give it to Jennifer when she tells off Sara. Version two is basically the same, except that it takes place in a field. There are some slight differences in dialog, with some lines being added, and some being changed. ZombiesThis scene happens during the chase between The Darkness, Eddie, and Sara. In it, Sara falls into a hole in the floor, caused by The Darkness, and lands in a subterranean cavern filled with dirt and skeletons. The Darkness then brings the skeletons to life, and they pull off the jacket that she's wearing. Eddie then rescues her by pulling her up out of the cave. This is why the jacket disappears from Sara during the chase. EpilogueThis was supposed to be the ending scene. In it, Sara's boss Jennifer Jenzen, and a real estate agent come to see the House, that was left to her in a will. She walks into the house alone, the door closes behind her, and she screams. The scene then goes back to the real estate agent (whose face was not shown until now) who turns to the camera, revealing himself to be Dr. Vannacutt. This scene counts as Combs' only speaking role in the film. SequelWarner Premiere released the sequel Return to House on Haunted Hill on DVD on October 16, 2007. The film has some ties to the first with one of the main characters being related to Ali Larter's character, as well as a few mentions of the events in the first film and the deaths of Steven Price and Sara Wolfe (who dies off screen in the second film). Credits songThe credits features a cover of Sweet Dreams by Marilyn Manson.
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