Monster House

On the day before Halloween, young Dustin James "D.J." Walters spies on his elderly neighbor, Horace Nebbercracker, who is known for frightening children off his property and confiscating their belongings. D.J.'s parents leave town for a convention, placing him in the care of his teenage babysitter, Elizabeth, or Zee. Later, D.J.'s best friend Charles "Chowder" Peterson loses his basketball on Nebbercracker's front yard and he attempts to retrieve it. When Zee's boyfriend Bones visits, he recalls Nebbercracker's theft of his kite and relates rumors of him cannibalizing his late wife. After Zee kicks him out, Bones sees his kite in the front door of Nebbercracker's house and tries to reclaim it, only to be abducted. D.J. and Chowder investigate and discover that the house is possessed by a poltergeist, which they assume is Nebbercracker's vengeful spirit. The trio saves a girl named Jennifer "Jenny" Bennett from the house as she sells candy for her school. Jenny calls the police officers Landers and Lister, but the house cunningly lies dormant when they arrive. The trio consults local supernatural expert Reginald "Skull" Skulinski, who speculates that the house can only be vanquished when its heart is struck. Deducing that its furnace is the heart, the trio constructs a dummy filled with cold medicine and offers it to the house in order to put it to sleep. However, Landers and Lister foil their plan and the house devours them all. The trio explores the now-asleep house and discovers a shrine to Nebbercracker's wife, Constance, whose skeletal remains are entombed in cement. The house awakens, but Jenny grabs its chandelier-based uvula and forces the house to vomit them back outside. Nebbercracker returns from the hospital alive, revealing that Constance is the house. He explains that when they first met, Constance was an unwilling freak show participant. Nebbercracker helped her escape as Constance restarted her life with him. One Halloween, children began harassing Constance, causing her to fall into the house's unfinished basement, where she was suffocated by a concrete mixer inadvertently activated in the chaos. Upon the house's completion, Constance's spirit merged with it, forcing her husband to feign aggression towards the children for their own safety. D.J. insists that they must put Constance to rest. Overhearing this, Constance uses a pair of trees to lift the house from its foundation and chase the group. They lure Constance to a nearby construction site, where Chowder combats her with an excavator as D.J. uses dynamite against the house to destroy it. Constance's spirit shares a moment with Nebbercracker before ascending to the afterlife.