If you’ve seen any of the films “A Haunted House” is parodying, like “Paranormal Activity 2,” “3” and “4,” you know how those scary movies go: Something insanely creepy or violent happens, people are terrorized, and a camera just happens to be around to film it all and frighten future viewers. It’s a cheap, effective way to make a film that will bring back big bucks at the box office. But “A Haunted House” (which wasn’t screened for press before its release) takes that premise and strips it of all tension and thrill, instead loading it with enough bathroom humor, vulgarity, and sexual innuendo to revolt a discerning viewer. Sure, the found-footage format of filmmaking has been overdone. Adding a number of different jokes that are disrespectful to women, homosexuals, and just about everybody, though, doesn’t make “A Haunted House” edgy or interesting or insightful. It’s just stupid.
The film focuses on Malcolm (Wayans, of “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra”), whose girlfriend, Keisha (Essence Atkins), has recently decided to move in. Excited about her arrival, Malcolm buys a new video camera to record this development in their relationship, thinking it’s a step along a positive path. (Or one that will lead him to making a sex tape.) So he’s shocked to learn that Keisha, after moving in, doesn’t want to be intimate with Malcolm as often—and that aversion is because she’s haunted by an evil entity (it may be a ghost, demon, or Malcolm’s dead dog; all three are suggested and used pretty interchangeably as the culprit) who won’t let her get physical. Shucks.
More rattled by the news that he won’t be getting any than by Keisha’s actual haunting, Malcolm decides to figure out a way to defeat the ghost so his relationship can go back to normal. But the abnormal presence isn’t above using its own tactics to stick around, like sexually abusing the people living in the house. Because that’s supposed to be funny.
For help, Malcolm calls in a variety of people who could start their own circus of the ridiculous. There’s gay psychic Chip (Nick Swardson, of “30 Minutes or Less,” “Just Go With It,” and “Bolt”), who can’t keep his hands off Malcolm and consistently coaxes or tricks him into uncomfortably suggestive situations. There’s security expert Dan (David Koechner, of “Hit and Run,” “Piranha 3DD,” “A Good Old Fashioned Orgy,” and “Paul”), who is so racist that you’re not surprised the n-word gets thrown around the film so much. And lastly, there’s priest Father Williams (Cedric the Entertainer, of “Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted,” “Larry Crowne,” and “Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa”), who has a little experience with prison and thinks a tough approach will work.
As each of them tries their hand at getting rid of the presence, “A Haunted House” becomes more foolish by the minute; sure, the film is barely an hour-and-a-half long, but that doesn’t mean Wayans doesn’t try his hardest to cram in as many lewd jokes as possible. Jokes about genitalia. Jokes about sex. Jokes about gay people. Jokes about women. Jokes about racism. Jokes about everything and anything, really, until “A Haunted House” forgets to be a spoof of the found-footage genre and just becomes a weird, amorphous entity that isn’t very funny at all. Sure, some scenes—like when all of Malcolm’s furniture hovers in midair, or pots and pans continuously fall on people mid-sentence—harken back to the visual tricks of the “Paranormal Activity” films. But there’s no cohesive narrative here or pointed commentary. It’s just dumb for the sake of being dumb.
The only part of the film when I legitimately laughed was early on, when Malcolm learns of the weirdness with his house and, unlike the occupants of so many other found-footage films, decides to leave, jumping into a van and frantically driving away. His reasoning? Black people don’t stay in haunted houses like white people do because they don’t want to investigate; instead, “we run.” It’s all very funny until you realize that comedian Eddie Murphy did the exact same bit in a standup special, “Delirious,” 30 years ago. Maybe Wayans was trying to give respectful homage, much like the film overall is supposed to be a well-reasoned parody. Alas—”A Haunted House” mightily fails in both respects.
