Haunting of Winchester House

I wont bother going into too much detail regarding the story as thats already been covered but if you try to imagine a really cheap bad horror from the 70's then you'll have it.

Winchester House itself is a relatively unknown haunted house but in the same vain as the Ammmityville house. I don't know whether the movie is supposed to be based around the true events that happened there or not but its respected enough that Most Haunted have actually done an investigation there.

The acting here is beyond laughable. For instance at one point one of the 'spirits' drag the daughter into a closet right in front of her mother while the mother stands there watching and only shows any shock at whats happening when the daughter is actually in the closet and the door slams. Was she not horrified by some ghost actually grabbing her daughter and dragging her from behind for 20 feet? Then you have the supposed 'psychic' who shows no knowledge whatsoever about the spirit world! The SFX look like they were done on your home PC using MS Paint or something lol. The direction and score are all horrible and the script so bad that its almost funny.

I had high hopes for this, expecting a new Ammityville or something and all i got was a couple of non intended laughs. If you are wanting a good horror with a creepy backdrop, a couple of jumps and something scary then go and watch the Teletubbies because thats a damn site scarier and much better acted lol.

The actors - especially the mother - seemed quite sincere in their roles, but the story itself didn't really make any sense. It all seemed so random - just random ghosts at random times coming after random people in random ways and doing random things with them, all for no apparent reason. The characters were pretty much text-book cookie-cutter. There were entirely too many full-on face shots where the heads of the characters filled up the entire screen, back & forth between them. I never realized how annoying that could be, but I've never seen that kind of shot so over-used before. There is no discernible story, just a bunch of disjointed, discombobulated "fragments". Not very well plotted. If you don't care too much about story but just like seeing people scream & ghosts go, "Boo!", this will do it for you. But if you're looking for an interesting or engaging story of some sort, this really doesn't cut it.

There isn't a whole lot to say about the film so I'll get right to the point. The acting was by far the worst part of it. The performances were forced, uninspired, and a pain to watch in some places.

That being said, the film at first seemed to be pretty much a mish mash of every other haunting movie, same scare tactics, same suspense builders, same basic idea of ghosts with unfinished business, etc. At first. After the film got going it was obvious that the writers were trying to take things in a different direction, and while overall the film will most definitely be buried amongst all the other "ghost movies" and "haunted house" movies, there was still an original idea or two to be found, and for a fan of the genre it was still worth a view to the end. Most of the plot you could see clear ahead for miles, though, and again the acting really detracted from scenes that would have otherwise been more intense. The script was a bit awkward in spots as well, so I can't blame the actors entirely.

Anyway, if you're teetering on the edge as to whether or not to spend the time or money on the movie, I'd recommend giving it a shot. If you haven't seen many horror films it's definitely worth a watch, and if you have, you might be pleasantly surprised.

I'm in film school reviewing movies over and over. I have to say, it's not the fault of the actors. The storyline on what the proper reaction would be to certain incidents is the fault of the script writer and the director. I wasn't bored in the movie. I saw the whole thing. All movies have defects- just some have less than others! Basically, the end shouldn't have ended like that. The moral of the story from this movie: Speak-up, don't let people exist with a lie! Tell them what really happened.

Okay there were countless reasons why this movie was atrocious. But i can honestly say that it was placed in the wrong genre. I really think it belongs in the comedy section of a movie store / netflix. The acting was HORRIFIC. The movie was supposed to last 1 hour 25 minutes but it took my sister and I almost 3 hours to watch because we had to stop and rewind and continue to laugh at the terrible acting attempts. First of all the family that arrives at the house moves in, eats dinner and falls asleep. When they wake up in the middle of the night they are WEARING THE SAME CLOTHES!!!!!!! not sure why no one notices this, but it definitely adds to comedy aspect of the movie.

The daughter was supposed to be 7 years old or something but she was taller than the mother and looked like she was about 17 years old. And WTF happened to that woman who flew backwards into a tree after creating the magic dove soap circle. Or the trashbag baby car seat.

The fathers side burns where awkward as hell and the mother sad to say was definitely the best actress in the movie which pretty much says it all.

This movie was LOL funny and if it were in the comedy section I would give it a 10 out of 10.