The Haunting in Connecticut

Some movies just should not start off by mentioning that what we're about to see is based on a true story. In the case of The Haunting in Connecticut, the movie betrays that comment by being eerily similar to past haunted house movies like The Amityville Horror, Poltergeist, and The Shining. If events did happen as they are depicted (which I naturally have doubts), then all the family would have to had done was have a marathon viewing session of those movies on video, and they'd have a one up on the spirits that were supposedly tormenting them. The ghosts here have obviously never met a horror cliche they didn't like.

The movie's not all bad. It's competently made, and the actors are game. It's just hard to get involved when the movie is so cinematic and obviously inspired by other films that you're constantly doubting the story's credibility. The original story took place supposedly in the mid 80s, when a family moved into an old house that was originally a funeral parlor with dark secrets. I remember seeing a TV documentary on the original case once, and being intrigued. Of course, I later learned that the author who was hired to document the haunting case was eventually told to make up most of it, due to the fact that the family who lived in the supposedly evil house couldn't keep their facts straight. So maybe it's okay if the movie creates its own take on the story, since everyone else involved apparently did. Regardless, The Haunting in Connecticut gives us a perfectly acceptable and perfectly standard haunted house movie that has one too many jump scares, and not enough human emotion, despite some early promise.

One thing I will credit the film for, it gives the family a decent reason to be living in the haunted house in the first place. The story kicks off with a troubled family who seem to be at the end of their ropes. Oldest teenage son Matt (Kyle Gallner) is dying of cancer, and his mother Sara (Virginia Madsen) has to drive him eight hours to Connecticut, where the nearest hospital that has the right program to treat him is located. It's obviously starting to take its toll on her, along with the fact that she has two other kids to take care of (Ty Wood and Sophi Knight), a niece (Amanda Crew from Sex Drive) who is living with them for reasons not explained in the screenplay, and her husband (Martin Donovan), who is a recovering alcoholic constantly on the verge of falling off the wagon. She's attracted to the abandoned old house, because it's so close to the hospital. Most of the family moves in (dad has to stay behind to hold onto his job, and comes up on weekends), and almost immediately, Matt starts being haunted by nightmarish visions of the house's past involving dark rituals and spirits being summoned. It doesn't help that his bedroom is in the dark, scary basement where the embalming room from the house's funeral parlor days used to be.

The movie goes for a psychological approach early on, making us wonder if the ghostly visions Matt keeps on seeing are hallucinations from the medical treatments he's receiving over at the hospital. Of course, it'd be kind of a tease if the haunting was all in his mind, so the story throws in the Reverend Popescu (Elias Koteas), who starts to clue the family into the fact that "something bad happened here". Given the fact that the character of Popescu is mainly here to explain the background story of the house, the screenwriters should have shown some wit, and just named him "Reverend Exposition". Once the truth is revealed, the ghosts start tormenting the entire family. Dark figures lurk in the shadows, mysterious footsteps beat against the floorboard, fluttering birds are heard underneath eerily rustling bed sheets, and zombie-like figures that have been burned to a crisp start popping up before the family members and the Reverend with alarming consistency. It's about this point that the screenplay pretty much drops any attempt to tell a story, and turns into an endless series of things popping out of the dark at characters.

First-time feature director Peter Cornwell (who shot to fame with the award-winning short animated film, Ward 13) shows a sense of style and atmosphere, and he never lets his cast ham it up too much, except for a scene where the father goes on a drunken rage against light bulbs. (Trust me, it makes sense in the context of the story itself.) It's simply the fact that the script does no favors to the director or the talented cast. It doesn't tell us enough about the family for us to be as emotionally involved with them as it wants us to be, and then rushes straight into the special effects sequences. The early moments of the film hint at a more human approach, with the mother fighting desperately to save her eldest son's life, but his disease is scarcely brought up again once they move into the house, except for some fleeting mention. At least Kyle Gallner's performance as Matt is appropriately weak and frail, so we never completely forget. It's just disappointing to see what could have been an emotional thriller downgrade into a generic and standard spookhouse flick.

The Haunting in Connecticut is not really bad, it's just another movie that made me feel like I've seen it all before. It's bound to happen, but it's always a let down when it does. In the end, it doesn't matter too much how accurate the film is to the actual events, or even if the actual events even happened at all. The main thing that matters is that this is a technically well done film that deserved a screenplay that was more interested in the characters rather then jump scares.

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