WhatzUp

1408

John Cusack plays Mike Enslin, a writer who has made a career out of authoring books about haunted hotels, haunted graveyards and the like. Mike himself doesn't believe in ghosts; when one fan asks him where one has the best chance of seeing one, Mike tells him to go to the Haunted Mansion in Orlando, Florida. One day, though, Mike receives an anonymous postcard warning him not to go into room 1408 of the Dolphin Hotel in New York City. Needless to say, Mike immediately sets about trying to book the room.

When Mike arrives to check in, though, the hotel manager, Mr. Olin (Samuel L. Jackson, in a tasty little cameo), tries to dissuade Mike by telling him about the 57 other people who have died in the room over the years. Mike is determined, though, and he threatens to sue if he's not permitted to rent the titular room for the night. (Can you, off the top of your head, think of at least a dozen ways management could have prevented the room from being used if they truly didn't want anyone to rent it? I can, too.)

According to Olin, nobody has ever lasted more than an hour in room 1408, and within minutes of Mike's arrival the clock radio by the bed is counting down from 60 minutes while playing a warped version of The Carpenter's "We've Only Just Begun."

Director Mikal Hofstrom infuses these early scenes with a pleasingly well paced, genuinely foreboding atmosphere. Unfortunately, the evil room shows its cards way too early in the game. Instead of a slow ratcheting up of the horror over the course of his stay, Mike is more or less immediately plunged into an increasingly surreal and over-the-top carnival ride o' horror that includes walls that crack and bleed; rooms that stretch, burn, freeze, collapse and transform at will; a melting telephone; massive amounts of splashing water; and a stunning light show that would make the most experienced Pink Floyd fan happy. As it happens, Mike's reference earlier in the movie to the Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyworld is completely appropriate, as we are treated to little more than a fast-paced procession of brightly-lit, PG-13 ghosties and ghoulies. The modest demands of the story's single-set locale has clearly made the film's over-funded producers restless – why settle for a sort-of creepy room when you have the budget to make it the best dang super-duper scary room money can buy?

The movie is basically a tricked-out thrill ride, but, of course, it would like to think it's something more: a pseudo-profound cross between This Is Your Life and A Christmas Carol maybe, in which Mike learns some really important lessons about himself and vows to do better next time. Cusack is a fine actor, but his basic job here is to do little more than react to all the things he sees with alternate expressions of disbelief, horror and regret.

The script doesn't even make good on its promise to keep us in the room for only 60 minutes, as 1408 has one tedious false ending after another. By the second or third false ending I was tapping my watch and muttering "Hey, time's up, buster!"