When I first saw this I wasn't much of a fan, and that wasn't due to comparing it to the original, as I hadn't seen Castle's 1958 version. Again while it isn't boring, due mainly to Geoffrey Rush's effectively diverting Vincent Price send up, and a saucy Famke Janssen. What we get is something of pretty sub-standard quality that heavily relies on glossy special effects, nasty blood spatter and contrived shocks of the tiresome kind. Dick Beebe's screenplay of Robb White's original story ups the twists, and unpleasant nature in a straight laced supernatural story. Even with its constant twists, it felt like they were there to cover how slight the premise was. The angle is more so serious and dark, though at times with a somewhat mock attitude compared with the plain outlandish, and overly campy style of the original. Which did make that one far more enjoyable, even with the usual haunted house devices. Here director William Malone goes about things in a conventionally slick, ultra-kinetic manner where it was just too streamlined (this being the art direction of the sombre looking house) and packed with many unconvincingly elaborated twists, and heavy handed jump scares that lacked any sort of unsettling punch. The basic "let's go for something that sounds really scary" music score, couldn't escape its generic notes of telegraphed predictability. At least the deaths are fairly twisted, and the morbid flair of Rush and Janssen's interplay is an unpredictable delight. The special effects weren't terrible and there a few well pulled off moments (like the jittery ghost doctors), but overall it didn't enhance or cook up much of a lasting atmosphere when they finally pile it on far too much. The final 15 minutes is a fine example. Ali Carter aggregately fluffs around, and Taye Riggs pretty much has that concerned face throughout. Peter Gallagher, Bridgette Wilson and Max Perlich make up the numbers. Jeffery Combs also appears in a spooky cameo part, that called out for more screen time.