House on Haunted Hill (1999 film)

House on Haunted Hill is a 1999 American horror film, directed by William Malone and starring Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Taye Diggs, Ali Larter and Jeffrey Combs. It also includes a cameo appearance by Peter Graves. The plot follows a group of strangers who are invited to a party at an abandoned asylum, where they are offeredmillion each by an amusement park mogul if they are able to survive the night. Produced by Robert Zemeckis and Joel Silver, it is a remake of the 1959 film of the same name directed by William Castle, and features special effects by famed makeup artists Gregory Nicotero and Dick Smith.

The head of a now abandoned asylum, Dr. Richard B. Vannacutt Jeffrey Combs, once performed grotesque experiments on the patients, killing many in the process. The hospital was closed in 1931 after the patients escaped from their cells, killing the entire staff except five who were not present and setting fire to the hospital. Vannacutt had rigged the building with numerous iron gates, activated by cranks and levers that cannot be reset for twelve hours, to keep patients from escaping. He closed the gates during the fire, dooming the patients and himself to death. Decades later, during reconstruction of the facility, several unexplained deaths result in the building being dubbed The House on Haunted Hill.In 1999, Evelyn StockardPrice Famke Janssen, a spoiled trophy wife, is in a disintegrating marriage with Steven Price Geoffrey Rush, an amusement park mogul with a wicked sense of humor. Price leases the house from the owner, Watson Pritchett Chris Kattan, for Evelyns birthday party. Evelyn gives Price a lengthy guest list he shreds it to spite her and then creates one of his own. Five guests arrive for the party Jennifer Jenzen Ali Larter, Eddie Baker Taye Diggs, Melissa Margaret Marr Bridgette Wilson, Dr. Donald Blackburn Peter Gallagher, and Pritchett himself. The guests are not the ones Price invitedneither Evelyn nor Price know who they are. Despite this, Price continues the partys theme, offeringmillion to each guest who stays in the house and survives until morning, with any person not making it having his money added to the pot. ........

Source: Wikipedia