Film

The Haunted Mansion

Name: The Haunted Mansion
Genre: Thriller, Fantasy, Comedy, Family, Mystery
Released: 2003
Cast: Eddie Murphy, Marsha Thomason, Terence Stamp, Nathaniel Parker, Jennifer Tilly

Fantasy

Eddie Murphy leads a family comedy-thriller about real estate agents stranded in a genuinely unsettling mansion full of ghosts, secret histories, and slapstick mayhem. It's a film that swings wildly between genuine creepiness and broad humor, never quite landing either perfectly, but committed enough to both that it stays weird and engaging throughout.

TMDb rating

2.8

If you liked this

Beetlejuice1988

Tim Burton's blueprint for comedic haunted houses: anarchic, visually inventive, genuinely funny, and surprisingly dark underneath. Michael Keaton's ghost is pure chaos.

But The humor is very '80s, and some of the effects look their age. It's silly by design, which won't appeal if you want horror to stay serious.

The Addams Family1991

Perfectly pitched family spookiness where the weirdness is the whole point. Witty script, beautiful production design, and the cast commits completely to every ghoulish joke.

But If you want genuine scares, this leans entirely toward macabre comedy. It's deliberately a lark.

Crimson Peak2015

Gothic mansion mystery with a genuine ghost story at its core, beautiful set design, and Tom Hiddleston doing subtle menace. Spectral and seductive without being silly.

But Paced slower than Haunted Mansion, with less comedy relief. Some find it pretty but dramatically slack.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Haunted Mansion

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Haunting1963

Both use a mansion as a character with its own agency. Haunted Mansion throws comedy at it; The Haunting uses dread. Opposite registers, same structural idea—a house that wants something from its visitors.

A psychological haunted-house film where the terror is ambiguous—is the house evil or is the protagonist losing her mind? Atmosphere built from shadows and suggestion, not jump scares. Robert Wise creates dread from architecture and ambiguity.

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Dark Shadows2012

Tim Burton and Johnny Depp make a fish-out-of-water comedy from a vampire soap opera. Weird tonal shifts between gothic romance and absurdist humor, but it commits.

But The tone is genuinely confused—it doesn't know if it's a comedy or a period drama, which some find frustrating rather than charming.

The Canterville Ghost1944

A lighter adaptation of Oscar Wilde's story, with a ghost trying to scare occupants and failing comedically. Charming and strange in a way that rewards its own oddness.

But It's in black and white and moves at a 1940s pace. If you want momentum, this will feel glacial.

Ghostbusters II1989

Less iconic than the first, but genuinely weird in its own right: New York flooded with mood slime, rivers of ectoplasm, the Statue of Liberty animated. Committed to its own strangeness.

But The original is so much better that this one lives in its shadow. Some jokes land with a thud.

House1985

A writer moves into a haunted house where his deceased son may still be. Blends genuinely unsettling moments with dark comedy and emotional stakes that sneak up on you.

But The tonal shifts are jarring—it moves abruptly from horror to joke to pathos. Some viewers will find it uneven rather than dynamic.

Poltergeist1982

A suburban family's house goes haywire with malevolent activity. Clever set pieces, genuine tension, and a craft that rewards close watching. The suburban-horror blueprint.

But It's genuinely scary in ways that make light comedy feel jarring if you're there for the creepiness. Darker than Haunted Mansion by far.

Casper1995

A friendly ghost and a living girl build an unexpected friendship in a haunted mansion. Sweet, sincere, and visually charming without being cynical about its own sincerity.

But If you're past the age where the sentiment works, it reads as saccharine. The humor is gentle to a fault.

Crimson Tide1995

Eddie Murphy plays a man out of his depth in a space controlled by forces he doesn't understand, stranded with a mysterious authority figure (Terence Stamp). Crimson Tide does the same setup—ordinary person trapped in an enclosed space with a powerful antagonist—but strips away all comedy and fantasy to ask what that pressure *really* does to someone.

A submarine thriller about a mutiny during a nuclear standoff. Denzel Washington and Gene Hackman locked in philosophical combat with the end of the world as collateral. Taut, intelligent, genuinely gripping.

But No ghosts, no comedy, almost no lightness. If you're drawn to Haunted Mansion's playfulness, this is the opposite register entirely—serious people in serious jeopardy.

The Ballad of Little Jo1993

Both films feature characters arriving at a place (mansion, frontier town) where nothing is as it appears, and where the people around them are living elaborate deceptions about who they are. Murphy's family is stranded in a house full of ghosts hiding their histories; Jo is a person hiding her identity in a town full of secrets. Same architecture of concealment, completely different emotional stakes and genre.

A woman disguises herself as a man to survive in the Old West. Geraldine Chaplin is extraordinary in a quiet, furious film about gender, identity, and the lies we tell to survive. Formally restrained, emotionally devastating.

But It's a western, it's in muted colors, it's slow, and it ends sadly. Nothing like Haunted Mansion in any visible way. Some will bounce off its deliberate austerity.