Until this animated horrorfest turns shrill, debuting director Gil Kenan delivers enough visual goods to justify the faith of producers Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemeckis, who hired him right out of UCLA. The house itself, which sucks up toys, kids and anything else that gets in its way, is a wonder. It's the heart of darkness in a squeaky-clean suburb where twelve-year-old DJ (Mitchel Musso) and his fat bud Chowder (Sam Lerner) team with teen hottie Jenny (Spencer Locke) to defeat the house and its cadaverous owner (Steve Buscemi). The voice work is exceptional, with a special nod to Maggie Gyllenhaal as a toxic-tongued baby sitter and Jason Lee as her raunchy-to-the-point-of-depraved boyfriend. Kenan is a talent to watch, even in a flick that doesn't know when to quit.

“He Will Break Your Heart”

A lightly swinging Latin-influenced, almost cha-cha groove and close harmonies decorated Jerry Butler's early soul hit "He Will Break Your Heart," delivering a stately warning that his rival would never love his girl like he did. The melody came to Butler as he was driving on the highway from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Philadelphia with Curtis Mayfield, and as Butler told Rolling Stone, "I just sang the melody and Curtis put the chords to it." The song's premise, Butler added, "was something that I'd lived ...The lyric was an experience rather than a revelation. Whereas music is usually a revelation."