Review: Haunt

If you are blessed with a local haunted house attraction in your area, might I suggest a better use of your two hours would be to go and experience the real thing?

---

Ah yes, we've now reached the part of the marathon where a movie defies me to have a strong opinion about it. I can usually avoid this type of thing at the start of the month, because I'll just skip movies like that, but as time ticks away and the jack-o-lantern candle burns low, it becomes harder and harder to toss away a fresh movie to review. The beast has to eat, even if all it gets is a lukewarm take on a lukewarm attempt at scares. Haunt falls into the esteemed(?) category of horror movies set at horror themed attractions. Much like other films of its ilk (e.g. Hell Fest), it boasts roughly the same amount of character development as your local haunted house attraction, as well. As you might imagine, the plot involves a group of college students chasing thrills at a mysterious haunted house where things turn out to be more real than they bargained for. Hijinks ensue.

If I'm coming off overly negative about Haunt, it isn't because it is a terrible, or even bad, version of what it is trying to be. It's really because there is so little to latch onto when critically examining the movie. There are actually some effective scares here, particularly involving a portion of the haunted house that is set up where our characters are seperated from the "scare actors" by a glass wall, and alarmingly realistic-looking murders are staged for their viewing. We, the audience, have no doubt as to the veracity of the murders because we know what type of movie we are watching, but it is easy to put yourself into the situation of the protagonists and realize how unsettling and unsure you would be if you were witnessing the same thing in real life. You are paying to be immersed in a scary situation and have your disbelief suspended, so do you trust your gut and treat it like a crime scene when something feels off, or do you just reckon you're getting your money's worth? Another effective aspect of the movie is the set design, and as someone who has frequented these types of attractions on and off since I was a pre-teen, it is fun to see a horror film set in the type of place that I've been many times before. I've elbowed my way through countless rooms with body bags suspended from the ceiling and clutched the railing in a number of vertigo-inducing spinning tunnels, so its a nice touch to see them here mixed in with the legitimate dangers facing the characters. They even bust out the old elementary school "cold spaghetti as brains" gag, which is a nice touch.

So, I don't really have a problem with Haunt. If you are into the "pretty young people get stabbed" genre exclusively for the stabbings of pretty young people, this film has you covered. I'll even give passing marks to the villains, who are at least a half-step above the mute, masked stabbers we often see. Yet, if you've been spoiled, like I have, by the wave of recent horror that prioritizes ambition and quality alongside of carnage, you will likely find that the film's impact evaporates before the credits have stopped rolling. At no point is any character's motivation examined, and apart from a limp attempt at a red herring, there is no real mystery to be solved behind the mayhem. I hesitate to say a movie is going through the motions, because it minimizes the very real effort and hard work that a lot of people surely expended to bring the movie to life, but... you get the point. Haunt is totally fine for the background of your Halloween party, or as a backdrop while you scroll social media from your couch, but you can do better if you want to invest in a spooky viewing experience that will fully capture your attention.