Haunted Mansion director Justin Simien recently shared that he was committed to the film’s source material, the original Walt Disney-approved ride and experience, “because the source is inspired.”
In an interview with Fandango’s Nikki Novak alongside the actors LaKeith Stanfield, Tiffany Haddish, Danny DeVito, and Rosario Dawson, Simien’s comments came after Stanfield and Dawson shared how close the film is to the ride.
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Stanfield began saying, “”I’m a big fan of things that are true to source material and I experienced the ride. That’s what it is, it’s an experience. It really is. It’s unlike any other ride, I think, to go through.”
He elaborated, “So seeing that the story that I was given paid close attention to detail in that way it really excited me because I don’t enjoy seeing things that aren’t the same as the thing that I enjoy.”
“But at the same time, to Justin’s point, there was rich, deep storytelling and characters that were compelling and the way that was able to be merged and married together was unique and I hadn’t read it in a script in awhile. So it was really profound to come across this,” he continued.
Stanfield then shared, “And it is, it feels unsettling in just the right way and I appreciate Disney for taking a step to do something different. Different in terms of the director. This is a fresh, new take on something, completely different than [2003 The Haunted Mansion film starring Eddie Murphy]. And we’re grateful for the original, but this is something that stands as its own beast and I’m really happy to have it.”
“And then sparring with people like Danny and Owen: it was hilarious,” he concluded.
Rosario Dawson would also compare the film to a ride. She began, “I saw the movie at 10 o’clock in the morning and ended up calling everyone to just gush about the chemistry, and the energy, and just how perfectly they embodied their characters. They’re such brilliant moments of just growth and development, and nuances to each of these characters in the midst of all of this story that was like can be really emotional and suddenly pivot very funny.”
She then provided an example, “There’s this very striking scene with LaKeith talking about these memories and it gets super emotional, I’m literally starting to tear up, and then you cut to his face and his reaction to the story and you’re like, ‘How are we going from crying to laughing like this.’ And you’ve got jump scares and all kinds of stuff that go one. So the movie is just, it’s a ride. It feels like a ride.”
“And I think talking about making that interpretation of the feeling of being it in, you know, this was Walt Disney’s, I think, one of the last rides he ever approved of,” Dawson continued. “It didn’t even go into use until two years after his passing. And it’s so interesting reading about the history of it because there was such a fight internally about like how scary do you make it, or how funny and spooky. Like is it scary or spooky, and what that line is.”
“And I think Justin, you did just a brilliant job of like holding that line throughout the entire film. And so it’s great,” she relayed.
Simien eventually shared his comments when asked about Easter eggs he incorporated into the film, “I’m a fanboy like I come from that fandom culture, okay? And especially with something like this I was like it only gets richer the truer we are to the source because the source is inspired.”
Referencing Dawson’s comments he said, “Like you were saying like there was a fight to figure out what the tone of this thing should be and that fight, that tension creates something really magical about it.”
“So I mean everything down to the paintings that were gone and then came back into the ride like I was clocking those, like, okay, we got to put that into a prominent spot,” he detailed. “Everything down to the doorknobs, okay. The way the doors are framed. Certainly the wallpaper had to be right, the ghost had to be right.”
“And the other thing that I wanted to bring to it is like a real sense of culturally being placed in New Orleans. Like it was really important to me that like, you know, we say this is in New Orleans. New Orleans is a very black city and it has many different cultures that come together and mix and find this kind of harmony together and I absolutely wanted to infuse that sort of authenticity into the ride too,” he concluded.
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The official description for the film states, “Inspired by the classic theme park attraction, Haunted Mansion is about a woman and her son who enlist a motley crew of so-called spiritual experts to help rid their home of supernatural squatters.”
The movie stars LaKeith Stanfield, Tiffany Haddish, Owen Wilson, Danny DeVito, Rosario Dawson, Chase W. Dillon, Daniel Levy, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Jared Leto.
It arrives in theaters on July 28th.
What do you make of Simien’s comments about the film and the closer you stay to the source material the richer the film will be?