Haunted Mansion Remake Looks Distinctly Scarier Than 2003 Eddie Murphy Version — Watch Trailer (Video)

The trailer for Disney’s new Haunted Mansion remake is out, and it looks a whole lot scarier than the 2003 Eddie Murphy version I grew up watching.

Well, it has been 20 years since the original movie came out, and that one was based on the Disney theme park ride. So it makes sense that in 2023 — an era where horror movies just keep getting more and more disturbing — that even Disney would ramp up the scares as much as possible while still keeping it relatively kid-friendly.

“Be careful, death lurks around every corner,” Devito’s character says in the new trailer.

What really tipped me off about the scare level in the trailer is the ghost lady in white with glowing eyes. Her jump scares are giving Woman in Black vibes, which strikes me as quite a departure from the 2003 version of the ghost lady (Master Gracey’s long-lost lover, Elizabeth Henshaw), who was played by the radiant Marsha Thomason. She also played Sara Evers, wife of Murphy’s character Jim Evers. Anyway, this new ghost lady is a lot more sinister than I remember her being in the 2003 version.

The 2023 remake doesn’t appear to be rated yet, but I suspect they’re shooting for PG-13. The 2003 film was rated PG.

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The new version seems to follow roughly the same plotline as the original, but the characters’ names have been changed — a family comes to stay in what they think is a nice vacation rental, not realizing that it’s completely bonkers haunted with ghosts that have a ton of… personality.

Arriving in theaters on July 26, the new Haunted Mansion stars LaKeith Stanfield, Rosario Dawson, Chase W. Dillon, Owen Wilson, Winona Ryder, Jared Leto, Tiffany Haddish, Danny Devito, Jamie Lee Curtis, Hasan Minhaj, and Dan Levy.

I will sincerely miss Terence Stamp, who played the butler-with-a-secret in the 2003 version.

Watch the full trailer for the 2023 Haunted Mansion above.

Main Image: A shot from The Haunted Mansion. Photo Credit: Disney.