Synopsis
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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Cast
- Mitchel MussoDouglas 'DJ' Hartner (voice)
- Sam LernerChowder (voice)
- Spencer LockeJenny Bennett (voice)
- Steve BuscemiNebbercracker (voice)
- Maggie GyllenhaalZee (voice)
- Kevin JamesOfficer Landers (voice)
- Nick CannonOfficer Lister (voice)
- Jon HederReginald 'Skull' Skulinski (voice)
- Jason LeeBones (voice)
- Catherine O'HaraMom (voice)
Recommendations
- 91
Entertainment Weekly
Kenan directs with a zingy sense of kids, comedy, fright, and visual perspective. But the movie also shimmers and shakes in all its motion-capture animated beauty with the slyly deep sensibilities of executive producer Robert Zemeckis. - 88
Philadelphia Inquirer
Easily the best computer-animated feature to come from Hollywood in a long while, Monster House is also one of the weirdest. A creepy-crawly, freak-show Halloween yarn. - 80
L.A. Weekly
Becomes one of those wonderfully weird adventure stories beloved of children who don't mind getting a good old-fashioned case of the heebie-jeebies. It's kind of a blast for adults too. - 75
The A.V. Club
Director Gil Kenan has a feel for dizzying "camera" work, and the screenplay combines witty gags with a sweet, albeit familiar, suggestion that kids shouldn't be in any great hurry to be anything but kids. - 75
Chicago Tribune
Set around Halloween, Monster House manages to cull bits and pieces from Hammer, Hitchcock and the old-dark-house genre of 19th Century literature and early 20th Century stage and film. - 70
Variety
Constant shock cuts and souped-up music and sound effects will keep small fry in a state of moderate petrification, while the trio of tweeny leads plus attitude-redolent cohorts will make teens feel welcome. - 70
New York Magazine (Vulture)
The movie might be scary for small kids--but good scary, with goose-bump-inducing frames, witty repartee, and three resourceful kid protagonists. - 40
Village Voice
The coolest thing about Monster House is that Kathleen Turner's face was actually motion-captured to create the house's movements, but actual human beings on-screen might have ratcheted up the tension, of which there is none.
