It has its familiar moments and a sprinkle of cliches, but The Haunting in Connecticut does prove to be a decent and quite interesting little haunted house film- feeling very reminiscent as well as inspired by The Amityville Horror. Personally I enjoyed this flick. Yeah, it has some melodramatic moments at times, but I was certainly never bored while watching it. The fact that this film has such low ratings, especially when compared to other anticipated flops like The Possession is quite alarming. The acting is pretty well done, namely from Virginia Madsen, Elias Koteas, and Kyle Gallner. The only one who isn't all that great is Martin Donovan as the father character, but he's hardly in the movie enough to make a difference- heck even the kid actors are decent in this film. The imagery throughout the movie is haunting and surreal, it crawls under your skin, and truly allows for the atmosphere to really shine throughout the film despite its more noticeable flaws. The cinematography is nice, and the story is pretty well paced, albeit a bit formulaic at times, but still enjoyable. In the end, I do not see why The Haunting in Connecticut deserves so much hate, and found it to be a rather decent little horror flick. It may have some similarities to horror films in the past, but its unique moments and inspired ones lend it to be a very entertaining and creepy film i'm glad I didn't pass on.
My Rating: 7.3/10.
