“Based on the true story,” sez The Haunting in Connecticut’s opening title, referring to a reputedly ghoul-infested house in Southington, Conn., that tormented a family in the mid-’80s and was avidly studied by paranormalist types who own their own night-vision goggles. True story or not, the movie plays like a feeble remake of some long-forgotten TV-movie Amityville Horror rip job, complete with doors that slam by themselves and demonically possessed shower curtains. That this hokum requires the overqualified likes of Elias Koteas to play a dimestore variation of Father Karras from The Exorcist seems particularly cruel.

Nor do Virginia Madsen and Martin Donovan fare much better as Sara and Peter Campbell, staunchly ordinary folks who move into the creepy old house in order to live closer to the hospital where their cancer-patient son is being treated. The ailing Matt (Kyle Gallner) is the first to notice the weird goings-on, which stem from the place’s history as a hotbed for ectoplasm-strewn séances. Vintage examples of spirit photography and references to occult
practices heighten the creep factor but, as is usually the case, the proceedings get less scary as the mystery is explained. Matters culminate in a climactic sequence so brazenly schlocky the movie should be followed by an apology from Count Floyd.