chgames-28385 Review of Haunted Mansion

Haunted Mansion (2023)

It's fun and have some funny moments, but it can feel heldback at points!

[7/10 · 9 October 2023]

The beginning and the set up for the film was so much fun to watch. It had lots of funny moments sprinkled throughout the film. I also loved how they set up this film. It was funny but yet, it had it kept on forshadowing on how this movie would get more errie and dark. While the first act and even maybe the 2nd act were all pretty good with enough potential for me to go on,it just kind of lost me in the 3rd act. I didn't very like how this whole movie was just about the theme of grief; now don't get me wrong, grief and how to handle it is a great theme, but for being a silly, kind of dark haunting movie, it felt out of place. It felt like because of the theme of grief, it felt limited to the hauntedness. It felt like it could have explored a lot more . . . Brought more fantasy and exploration to the table, a few more hauntings, and lore of the "next realm." But the grief theme felt like it was restraining it. It felt like after we find out the whole grief thing and how it played in this movie, it kind of went down hill from there on forth. Now don't get me wrong; I enjoyed my time with this movie for the first half. It was enjoyable, scary enough to get me some goosebumps, and even had some good laughs. The characters were likeable and fun to be around with, and I thought the potential plot I hoped was more than it turned out was great. But after the first half is done, we go down a second half that isn't as fun or potentially more daring to explore the movie. It felt restrained . . . We could have done more exploring aound this haunted place and maybe even into the other realm of ghosts. The grief theme was handled fine in this movie, don't get me wrong, but it felt wrong to be in this movie. It felt like all the fun kind of got sucked out near the end, and all I was watching were ghosts and humans and screaming. For the most part, I enjoyed it. It was a fun time, enjoyable with many likeable characters, and what could have been potentially even better, but bogged down with the theme of grief and felt restraining because of that, the second half of the movie doesn't feel as fun or enjoyable to watch as the first!