ILLUSTRATION BY RAJ DHUNNA
“We have people hanging from rafters, flying around, jumping off things... alligators! It’s childhood-dream stuff, really.” Director Justin Simien is talking Empire through a particularly batshit-sounding sequence in his particularly batshit-sounding new movie. Based on the spooky Disneyland ride of the same name, Haunted Mansion looks to blend supernatural comedy with action set-pieces and horror that “really packs a punch,” chuckles Simien. “It’s a family adventure, but when it gets scary, it gets scary.”
If this all sounds wilder than expected, then that was very much the intention. “The ride itself has this subversive undertone,” says Simien, who worked at Disneyland as a teen, spending lunchbreaks in the Haunted Mansion. “It speaks to all generations simultaneously and weaves different mysteries together like gossamer. That’s the tone we wanted for the movie.”
The ride has been adapted for screen before, with the 2003 Eddie Murphy offering of the same name. “Ours is a very different film,” says Simien. “A fresh start for the franchise.” The plot centres on single mother Gabbie (Rosario Dawson), who moves into a rundown New Orleans manor to discover it teeming with eccentric phantoms, and drafts in a squad of “ghost fanatics”, including Owen Wilson’s priest, Tiffany Haddish’s medium, LaKeith Stanfield’s paranormal expert and Danny DeVito’s spectre-obsessed academic, to deal with the ghouls. And then there’s a performance-captured Jared Leto, being “weird, creepy [and] funny” as the villainous Hatbox Ghost.
To get this impressive ensemble into the “woo-woo headspace”, Simien gave each actor their own crystal, to “bring clarity, amplify energy... Just tune into [paranormal] thinking, so it felt authentic on screen.” Further ventures into the offbeat occurred throughout, not least in the aformentioned batshit scene. “That takes place in the ‘Stretching Room’,” teases Simien. “The walls stretch and you can’t tell if you’re going up or down... It’s a nuts sequence.” Ghosts, monsters and M.C. Escher-inspired architecture: this might be Disney’s weirdest swing yet.
TOM
ELLEN