The Haunting in Connecticut

"Aren't you the one who says we can't live on lies?" "That was when you were a drunk and a liar."

The protagonist of The Haunting in Connecticut is a teenager with cancer, which is a gutsy move for what’s otherwise a straightforward horror film. It seems cruel to inflict a full-on haunting, complete with disturbing visions and vengeful ghosts, on a kid undergoing crippling chemotherapy, but horror is not a genre that thrives on kindness to its characters. Indeed, it’s the unexpected terminal illness hook that gives this adequate haunted house flick its verve.

Though Matt Campbell’s cancer eventually becomes integral to the story (in ways not entirely satisfying), the movie isn’t content to use it as a plot device. This is key; I’m not lightly offended, but giving your protagonist cancer just for the sake of a plot twist would have struck me as in poor taste. But the movie really seems to care — about Matt, about his parents (Virginia Madsen and Martin Donovan), and about the strain his disease puts on his family.

As the film opens, the Campbells are uprooting themselves and moving temporarily into a big old house that has “a bit of a history,” but also the advantage of being close to the hospital where Matt is undergoing his excruciating experimental treatment. Tensions and frustrations run high. We learn more about these characters than we’d expect from a movie like this: that dad used to be an angry drunk, for example, and that the family is somewhat in denial about a looming financial meltdown caused by the rent, the travel, and Matt’s medical bills. And there are some lovely, beautifully acted little moments: watch for the lighthearted back-and-forth between Matt and his mom as they share a gross protein shake (solid food is a problem for cancer patients sometimes).

The film works so hard at painting a plausible portrait of a family in crisis that the inevitable bumps in the night seem almost extraneous at first. The eerie noises, fleeting glimpses of shrouded figures, and sudden loud flashes of we-don’t-know-what that plague Matt are familiar and not particularly scary; The Haunting in Connecticut is kind of moody, and there’s some nifty imagery late in the film, but it doesn’t even try for intensity. Those looking for hard-hitting horror will probably leave disappointed.

But the implications of Matt’s disease make things more interesting. We learn that hallucinations are a side effect of his treatment, and that if they manifest, he will be dropped from the experimental study. So when Matt begins acting strangely and reporting visions, his family reacts with profound dismay. When things really get weird, their dismay turns to pity and then fear. It’s a plausible response that’s more disturbing than any of the film’s mild-mannered scares, and it adds a compelling dimension to some pretty pedestrian material.

The haunted house backstory actually plays out in a way that’s not entirely boring, and the ending is nicely ambiguous — though it’s also a huge cop-out. First-time director Peter Cornwell does a nice job with the look of the film, giving it a yellow color palette that intensifies in the scarier scenes and pulls back during quieter moments with the family. The Haunting in Connecticut would have been stronger were its horror elements less half-hearted, but it’s far more intriguing than your average PG-13 genre entry.

-- Eugene Novikov

Released:	2009
Starring:	Elias Koteas, Martin Donovan, Virginia Madsen, Kyle Gallner
Directed by:	Peter Cornwell
Rated:	PG-13