Review of House on Haunted Hill (1999) by Aversion68 — 01 May 2021

This remake borrows some elements from the original 1959 film including the limo-like Cadillac funeral cars in procession at the beginning of the film which bring the guests to the house, the promise that whoever survives the night gets the money, the house being automatically locked down after everyone arrive, a man jumping to save a woman from the falling chandelier, the mini-coffins with handguns in them, the idea that the wife and her lover are trying to drive a woman from the group insane enough to kill the wife's husband, both husband and wife faking their deaths, and the character of Pritchett (named Pritchard in the original).

The other main characters are also inspired by the characters from the original, but they deffer from them in some ways as well, unlike Pritchett. However, the biggest difference between the two versions of the film is that the original focuses almost entirely on the love triangle murder plot and the ghosts, which are never shown, are completely secondary to the story since they don't hurt or kill anyone or impact the plot in any way.

Other key differences include the surprisingly small body count in the original, and the fact that the house in that version of the story is not an asylum so there are no mad doctors, patients or nurses.

Also, the slightly ambiguous ending of the original film has no big supernatural climax.