When you are making a movie that revolves around a mystery, by the time the film reaches its conclusion the viewer had better still care about the solution to that mystery.

If an audience is leaving the theater asking themselves "So what?" then something went wrong.

This is the problem with "Cold Creek Manor." There is an answer to the mysterious past surrounding the titular residence, but the answers aren’t shocking, entertaining or worth the time it took to figure it all out.

A rough, momentum-less script by Richard Jeffries might have been salvaged with a little more work by those involved in the production.

Unfortunately, director Mike Figgis tries to compensate for the thin storyline with overly elaborate camera angles that become increasingly excessive and out of place during the course of the film.

Figgis’ complicated crane pans and dolly shots do little to help headliners Dennis Quaid and Sharon Stone, who spend most of the film as bewildered as the audience as to why they are starring in this glossy trash.

When big city life in Manhattan becomes too much for Cooper (Quaid) and Leah (Stone) Tilson, they pack up their two children and move out to the country. The four instantly fall in love with the dilapidated but cheap (thanks to a bank foreclosure) Cold Creek Manor.

It is a real head-scratcher why the Tilsons would ever want the run-down dwelling which looks like something out of "The Great Gatsby" crossed with "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre." But no matter, the plot wheels are turning.

The ex-Gothamites soon find themselves in all kinds of trouble when they hire the house’s former owner, Dale Massie (Stephen Dorff), to help them renovate.

Massie is so obviously the bad guy that his presence screams trouble even when the viewer knows nothing about him.

Ruckus ensues as the family is put through the ringer in scenes involving snake infestation, dead horses and a long overdue climax that steals directly from better films such as "Straw Dogs" and "Panic Room."

Both Quaid and Stone are strictly on autopilot here, forcing their characters to run about and do heinously stupid things that no real people would ever do. (When being chased by the crazed maniac, why does everyone always go upstairs?)

Bad guy Dorff scowls and squints as needed, but his over-the-top performance lacks subtlety and any real threat, something that a movie like "Cold Creek Manor" desperately needs. Dorff was much better as the villainous vampire leader in "Blade," a movie that called for excess and scene chewing.

The Tilson children Jesse (Ryan Wilson) and Kristen (Kristen Stewart) are put in unnecessary scenes of ominous danger, but serve no real purpose and inexplicably leave the film for its climax. All the while, the adults in the movie choose to wisely leave windows and doors open all the time.