At The Movies: Fun times with Disney’s Haunted Mansion and Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret

 Disney’s Haunted Mansion (PG13)

123 minutes, opens on Wednesday

3 stars

The story: Single mum Gabbie (Rosario Dawson) and her young son (Chase Dillon) enlist a gaggle of paranormal experts to rid their crumbling Louisiana mansion in the American South of otherworldly squatters.

There are famously 999 happy haunts in Disneyland’s The Haunted Mansion, but in the supernatural comedy Disney’s Haunted Mansion – the second Hollywood adaptation of the theme park ride following the 2003 Eddie Murphy flop – the ensemble of half-dozen mortal talents is the attraction.

Owen Wilson plays a priest. Tiffany Haddish is a psychic, Danny DeVito a professor, and Oscar nominee LaKeith Stanfield from Judas And The Black Messiah (2021) stars as local New Orleans tour guide Ben Matthias.

He is roped into the ghost-busting team for having once been a genius astrophysicist with expertise in “ghost particles”, although he has become a depressed drunk since his wife’s death.

Some day, in some movie, director Justin Simien of the 2014 Sundance Film Festival hit Dear White People might explore grief – Ben’s, Gabbie’s, as well as all of the trapped spirits – in some meaningful depth.

This kid-pic is not that movie. It is a haunted house adventure tame to the point of quaint with its creaky corridors, cobwebs and candelabras.

Its over-long runtime is enlivened only by the game cast, whose characters, everyone a fraud, find heroism by uniting against the malevolent Hat Box Ghost in a climactic battle-unto-death.

The magnetic Jared Leto is rendered unrecognisable by special effects as this arch poltergeist: He is basically a skeleton with a hat on. But Jamie Lee Curtis’ disembodied head in a crystal ball is a definite bonus and most amusing.

Hot take: The phalanx of CGI (computer-generated imagery) phantoms pales next to the comic actors, who are blithe spirits in this serviceable family-friendly spooktacular.

 Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret (PG13)

106 minutes, opens on Thursday exclusively at The Projector

4 stars

The story: Hollywood finally gets round to Judy Blume’s 1970 young-adult literature landmark centred on the coming-of-age adventure of 11-year-old Margaret Simon (Abby Ryder Fortson), who uproots with her parents from New York City to the New Jersey suburbs.

Ryder Fortson is endearing in her innocence and angst, starring as the title heroine of Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.

The comic drama takes place over a nostalgic 1970, the year the book was published. Margaret’s anxieties are nevertheless timeless – from fitting into a secret girls’ club to the thrill-cum-dread of the first kiss, first bra and first period.

She prays for guidance. “Are you there, God?” she entreats.

If He was not, there was always Blume. To generations of confused tweens, the American author, now 85, was both confidante and counsellor, her collective works a sacred text for navigating the quagmire of puberty.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret has been consistently banned in the United States for its candid discussion of sexuality.

Director-screenwriter Kelly Fremon Craig is unbowed by the conservatives. “The blood is released though the vagina” is how her movie explains menstruation.

Religion is another taboo topic, and Fremon Craig’s humorous yet sensitive sophomore feature, which is like a sweet little sister to her excellent debut The Edge Of Seventeen (2016), is just as open about Margaret’s doubting of God’s existence.

Her father (Benny Safdie) is Jewish. Her mother was raised Christian, and Rachel McAdams is a standout in the role of a bohemian art teacher transitioning clumsily into a suburban housewife.

Kathy Bates is a firecracker playing the doting grandmother meanwhile left behind alone in Manhattan. The two actresses lend Margaret glowing support as adults braving their own growing pangs.

Hot take: Rejoice. This adaptation of a beloved bestseller is a funny, loving and effervescent joy.