If anything can thwart the terror incited by yet another found-footage horror film, maybe Marlon Wayans is it. Or not. The funnyman stars in (and co-wrote) the toss-away comedy, A Haunted House, which runs like an over long sketch on a genre that has beaten to death by serious and spoof takes.
Wayans plays Malcolm, who invites his girlfriend Kisha (Essence Atkins) to move in with him, but after she has invaded the bachelor pad, strange things begin to happen. So, Malcolm installs a bunch of surveillance cameras that capture the action, from poltergeist-style flying objects to bizarre sexual behavior. There are fart jokes, relationship gags, sex humor, and plenty yelling and screaming. Marlene Forte stars as Rosa, a Hispanic housemaid whose presence serves only to allow Wayans the opportunity to try and spin racial-themed humor in a new way. The problem here is nothing is very new or well-spun. And while the movie manages to elicit a chuckle or two (Nick Swardson’s turn as the aggressively homosexual psychic Chip scores a few laughs before the bit tires out), there is little that will prevent A Haunted House from a long afterlife as a forgotten film.
