What a beautiful movie!

brilliant actors, brilliant editing

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Happily married Lara Flynn Boyle and Colin Ferguson (as Colquitt "Col" and Walker Kennedy) live in a beautiful country home. They are okay being childless – although Ms. Boyle pouts, in the opening, some awareness about her "eggs" getting old at age thirty-four. There is a faint subplot about children which could have been more haunting. Boyle (as narrator) tells us a haunted house was built next door. Due to some unexplained incidents, Boyle and Mr. Ferguson have decided to have a showdown in "The House Next Door" – even though it may end their lives… Eighteen months earlier, we watch the events which slowly lead up to the opening scenes. The house is built by attractive architect Mark-Paul Gosselaar (as Kim). One day, he works up a sweat and has to shower at Boyle's place. You expect something to happen, but it doesn't – all the weird stuff happens in the house next door...It is an unusual and difficult building to manage– but, it's a beautifully-designed building. Watching different people move in and try to live there is entertaining. The first one to leave is Mr. Gosselaar, who notices something strange has happened to him while building the place. Gosselaar helps sell the house and tries to get away, but not for long. This is an average TV movie production, with a couple of problems. Most obvious, the ending is a big disappointment. Of course, it's better not to say much – you'll see for yourself. Part of this has to do with some confusion about the characters – including the House as a real or inanimate character. This was based on a successful novel by Anne Rivers Siddons, which was undoubtedly clearer. Director Jeff Woolnough gets his best results in the house, especially building tension in effective scenes with Iraq War mom Julie Stewart (as Anita Sheehan).***** The House Next Door (10/30/06) Jeff Woolnough ~ Lara Flynn Boyle, Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Colin Ferguson, Julie Stewart

... is twofold. Firstly, it totally destroys, with a plodding, boring and mucousy script, a fine novel that Stephen King had singled out as one of the best horror stories of the last century in his essay "Danse Macabre" (1981). The second jolt comes from seeing Lara Flynn Boyle's lips slowly disintegrate all through the movie from the sheer weight of the collagen they are stuffed with. Her mouth gradually descends in her face in a very ominous and asymmetrical fashion, unsupported by facial muscles that are already rendered weak and useless from too many Botox injections. The end result is an inverted wedge of a mouth incapable of smiling or any other recognizable human expression. Those are the only things that qualify this mess as truly scary, if you don't count the sheer ugliness, vulgarity and faux-modern ordinariness of the house itself.

This is not an entirely bad movie. The plot (new house built next door seems to be haunted) is not bad, the mood is creepy enough, and the acting is okay. The big problem I had is that, being familiar with Lara Flynn Boyle (from Twin Peaks and other shows), I couldn't get over how different she looks with her apparently new, big lips. I kept staring at them. They look so out of place on her face! They make her look completely different (and not better).Mark-Paul Gosselaar, the actor who plays Kim the architect who designs and pours his heart and soul into the house, does a fine job. And Lara (as Col) is also quite good (but those lips!) as the owner of the house next door. Her husband, Walker (Colin Ferguson) is appropriately wooden. The various characters who live in the house were also fine. I particularly liked Pie (Charlotte Sullivan) and her husband, Buddy (Stephen Amell), the first people to move into the house. The attempt to involve us in the overall neighborhood vibe fails, unfortunately, as the other neighbors are not particularly likable.For some reason the director was unable to make the "haunted" house particularly ominous. Other movies (such as Amityville Horror, The Legend of Hell House) manage to achieve that spooky feel, but it just doesn't happen here. The closest is when Col paints a depiction of the house.Another thing that didn't work for me is the plot twist that occurs with Kim, the architect. Initially, he appears to be a victim of the house like the others (it has sucked him dry of inspiration), but later he seems to have joined forces with it in evil.Overall, not a bad movie for horror fans if you can take your eyes off those big lips!

When I heard that this movie was coming out the night before Halloween, I was very excited. When I found out that it was a book, written in 1978, I had to read it before seeing the movie. I'm sure the movie would have been much different to me if I had not read the book. The writers actually did a good job of staying true to the main plot of the book, with minor differences, naturally. I think the thing that disappointed me the most about the movie was Boyle playing the role of Col. I'm not a big fan of Boyle, and it seems that no matter what the mood during the movie, she's always trying to use her over-plumped lips, and darkly makeup-ed eyes to make herself seem super sexy. Indeed, I think that the movie held true to the genuine creepiness of the house. My favorite subplot was the Sheehan family (which is so weird b/c the son was killed in Iraq and in current events there is Casey Sheehan whose mother went on a huge anti-Iraq tirade). In the book, obviously the war was not Iraq, but rather, Vietnam, and when the house turns on that video of the son in the helicopter, I was truly creeped out. Overall, I was impressed with the movie, in that it followed the book very well.