Some of the lead performances are decent (particularly Elisha Cuthbert), and there is a decent attempt at establishing character relationships. There is a conflict between leading lady’s ne’er-do-well brother and her boyfriend, which seems to promise some interesting dramatic development, with the delinquent brother emerging as the one with superior survival skills and engaging our sympathy because of his loyalty in the face of danger. Also, the script sets up some intriguing ideas: both the heroes and the villains include a pair of twins who have been arbitrarily labeled “good” and “bad,” whether or not the distinction is accurate.

Unfortunately, once the horror kicks in during the second half, all these ideas are abandoned, and the story turns into a mechanical thriller that is utterly brain-dead and cliché-ridden. Too often, the viewer knows what's going to happen. For example, the psycho-killer shot twice by a crossbow predictably show up for the final reel showdown, little worse for the loss of blood (on top of having a metal shaft still imbedded in his chest).

Even worse, the gross-out moment reduces the characters into targets in a shooting gallery, losing the element of audience identification that initially seems on the verge of making this a genuinely frightening film. In the low-point, our otherwise resourceful heroine gets the tip of her index finger snipped off by the villain when she tries to signal for help by foolishly sticking the unfortunate digit up through a grate—where the killer can see it—instead of making some noise that might drawn the attention of her brother.

As if this were not bad enough, the finale tosses in an arbitrary and totally meaningless “twist” that seems left over from an earlier draft of the script. The identification (established in a prologue) of one twin brother as good and the other as bad is inverted (i.e. we’re told that the one who hides his deformed face behind a scary wax mask was the “good” child). This leads to an absurd moment when the heroine appeals (with predictably futile results) to her attacker’s better nature—despite the fact that she knows he is responsible for killing several of her friends by this point.

Visually, the film has a few nice ideas of the ghoulish variety. A pit full of road-killed animals strikes the proper chord of disgust in the early stages, setting up the horror to come. More impressive, the titular museum is a literal "House of Wax" -- not just the dummies but the walls and furnishings, which makes for a spectacularly gooey climax when a fire breaks out near the end.

This is one of the few moments reminiscent of the 1953 film, which began with a fire, instead of ending with one. The other vestige of the old film is the killer whose real face is covered with a wax mask, but this little detail is so overwhelmed by other gross-out scenes that it is ultimately anti-climactic and pointless.

On the plus side, Paris Hilton (who walks through the film like a model, all but smirking at the camera) gets a death scene truly worthy of her terrible performance: a pipe through the skull. As gross as the image is, it's kind of funny. I get it, think -- 's brain-dead!P align=center>TRIVIA