William Malone's remake of William Castle's classic spook story House on Haunted Hill scored high marks for special effects and humor but is basically inferior to the original. Malone's version does, however, get the benefit of this superb DVD repackaging, which does much to compensate for the movie's frailties. An excellent anamorphic widescreen transfer of the film gives it a crisp, balanced look, with no visible flaws or defects. The Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track has clearly been mixed to prioritize the sound effects rather than the dialogue, ensuring that all the eerie creaks and clanks are rendered with maximum impact. The disc comes with an excellent array of additional features, including the original theatrical trailers for both Malone's and Castle's films. The 20-minute "Tale of Two Houses" featurette analyzes the two versions in some depth and is thoroughly absorbing, even if it leaves the viewer surer than ever that Castle's original is the better of the two. Six behind-the-scenes mini-documentaries explain many of the undeniably impressive special effects used in the film, and among the DVD-ROM features is a silly but mildly entertaining game called "Escape from the House." Director Malone introduces the deleted footage from the movie, including a strangely low-key but amusing epilogue, and explains the reasons for the deletions. He also provides a commentary track, and his observations are generally very interesting and incisive. House on Haunted Hill may be only a moderately successful horror film, but judged on its own terms this is an outstanding disc.