Monster House (2006)
Directed by Gil Kenan
Monsters under the bed are scary enough, but what happens when an entire house is out to get you? Three teens aim to find out when they go up against a decrepit neighboring home and unlock its frightening secrets.
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After a brilliant opening sequence that references Zemeckis' own Forrest Gump by way of Roald Dahl, we're introduced to DJ (Musso), an ordinary 12-year-old transitioning from being a Halloween fanatic to a teen with precious little time left on his internal gosh-wow, sense-of-wonder clock.
It’s also the first film for newcomer director Gil Kenan, though the presence of executive producers Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemekis is evident from the opening shot, with the flight of a falling autumn leaf echoing both Forrest Gump’s white feather and The Polar Express ’s train ticket.
Filmmaker Robert Zemeckis ("Back to the Future," "Forrest Gump") last directed "The Polar Express," an animated film that featured motion-capture digital characters that were rubbery-faced and looked unreal.
With a tip of its hat to "Polar Express" star Tom Hanks, "Monster House" begins with a "Forrest Gump" homage, following a swirling autumn leaf to its cross path with a little pigtailed girl (voice of Ryan Newman) joyously lalalaing her way along on her tricycle.
I admit to writing off “Monster House” upon its arrival, only because while the film is wonderful, the story isn’t exactly original (ahem—Robert Wise’s “The Haunting”, anyone?), but the combination of a strong script, and truly down to Earth characters make “Monster House” a short but very entertaining piece of horror fantasy that reaches down into really human themes of loneliness, death, and puberty.
A spooky story for kids, Monster House employs an interesting methodology to create animation out of live action, borrowing the technique developed by Robert Zemeckis for 2004's The Polar Express.
It is the same technique as that of Zemeckis’ own The Polar Express (a timeless, gorgeous film), and those who had issues with the execution in The Polar Express will likely have the same complaints here.
Using the motion-capture technique popularized by one of the film's executive producers, Robert Zemeckis, in "The Polar Express," Kenan's hyperactive visual style aptly reflects the soon-to-be raging hormones of his pre-teen protagonists.
The animation process familiar from The Polar Express has been improved upon and is deployed to great effect for the relatively harsh tale of two pubescent boys -- and the pigtailed girl they pine for -- who investigate the angry residence across the street.
It will be a relief to anyone who unwillingly accompanied a minor to 2004's treacly megahit The Polar Express to learn that Gil Kenan's Monster House, although enamored of the same “performance-capture” technology that made Express's plasticky characters so memorably creepy, does not feature Steven Tyler as a singing North Pole elf.
The computer animation is superb, using the same “motion capture” technique utilized for The Polar Express.
Bad timing aside, the story by Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab (plus Pamela Pettler) â the writing team behind the cult Jack Black/Owen Wilson pilot Heat Vision and Jack â is a wispy thing that, surprisingly, given its Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemeckis producerial pedigree fails to adequately evoke the sheer kidhood magic of the Halloween season.
"Monster House," on the other hand, is full of welcome creepiness due to the terrific script by Dan Harmon & Rob Schrab (of the never aired cult television show "Heat Vision and Jack") and Pamela Pettler ("Corpse Bride"), great imagery and the dynamite voice work by its uniquely assembled cast.
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Filmmaker Robert Zemeckis ("Back to the Future," "Forrest Gump") last directed "The Polar Express," an animated film that featured motion-capture digital characters that were rubbery-faced and looked unreal.
What many will enjoy about this film is that it’s very much in the spirit of classics like “The Monster Squad” and “The Goonies”, in which we have a small group of kids whom are also outcasts that have to take on a giant obstacle when no one will stand in and help them out.
What many will enjoy about this film is that it’s very much in the spirit of classics like “The Monster Squad” and “The Goonies”, in which we have a small group of kids whom are also outcasts that have to take on a giant obstacle when no one will stand in and help them out.