It seems really odd to base a film on a fairground ride. Imagine Dodgems - The Movie, or a two-hour drama about the rotor - a tedious, spinning ride where teenagers use the G-force to spit at each other.

Yet spitting at your mates could well be more amusing than watching Murphy try to regain his comedy glory of Beverly Hills Cop and Trading Places.

The Haunted Mansion is, apparently, a Disney ride much like summer box office smash Pirates of the Caribbean.

In its celluloid incarnation it concerns New Orleans real-estate guru Jim Evers (Murphy).

Evers is so obsessed with gathering coin that he rarely finds the time for his lovely wife Sara (Marsha Thomason), son and daughter.

One weekend Evers diverts a family trip to stop off at a crumbling Deep South mansion so he can assess its value.

There they find Master Gracey (Nathaniel Parker), his butler Ramsley (Terence Stamp) and the 999 ghosts that fill the house.

The Evers clan gets stranded by a thunderstorm and have to overnight in the mansion, where they endure standard haunted house fare - floating furniture, strange noises, secret passages and glowing ghosts.

Haunted Mansion is deeply unoriginal, the script is clunky and the funny parts are thinly spread. But the effects aren't too bad and the mansion has plenty of atmosphere.

Murphy and Stamp waste their talents in this short comedy and seem relieved when it hits its trite, family-unifying ending.

But director Rob Minkoff (Stuart Little, The Lion King) has left in enough smiles and moments to make this bearable for a family outing. Everyone else might join the queue for the waltzer.

Mono rating: four out of ten