Now, here's some fizzy summer fun: Monster House, a frankly horrific and full-tilt hilarious family yarn about a man-snacking mansion. It's engineered to scare your pants off, split your sides and squeeze your tear ducts into submission.

Animated with motion-capture technology that tracks the movements and expressions of live actors before computer-zapping them into cartoons, the movie bears a superficial resemblance to the similarly-made Polar Express — by one of Monster House's executive producers, Robert Zemeckis. Officially, the new film's director is film-school grad Gil Kenan, making his feature debut. But you needn't look too closely to find the ubiquitous paw prints of another exec producer, the ever-imitable Steven Spielberg.

There's no mistaking him: The absent parents and intrepid, boisterous kids (E.T.). The ugly-legged monstrosity in hot pursuit (War of the Worlds). The creature-goes-ape-on-a-car scene (Jurassic Park). The brassy heroics (Raiders of the Lost Ark). The sniffle-inducing end (take your pick).

All of these blockbuster chunks are whipped into an entertaining froth — along with spunky voice work and irreverent, utterly believable characters that give the film an unexpected buzz of realism. The kids in Monster House look, act and sound like flesh-and-blood pre-teens.

So it's the day before Halloween. Our hero, D.J. (voiced by Mitchel Musso), happens to live across the street from the crotchety old Nebbercracker (Steve Buscemi) and his rickety old house. Whenever a child drops anything on the lawn — a tricycle, a ball — Nebbercracker runs out, seizes the item and rants maniacally about property rights.

Then, one fateful day, D.J.'s best chum, Chowder (Sam Lerner), loses his basketball on the geezer's voracious lawn: Movie geeks will note that it's a Wilson, the same brand of sports equipment that befriended Tom Hanks in Zemeckis' Cast Away. D.J. attempts to retrieve it. In the dust-up that follows, Nebbercracker hoists him in the air and suffers a heart attack. "I'm a murderer!" D.J. moans. "No, you're not," Chowder reassures him. "When it's an accident, they call it manslaughter."

Fortunately, D.J.'s parents are away. Unfortunately, the baby sitter (Maggie Gyllenhaal) is a skinny goth witch. Fortunately, D.J. and Chowder are spying on Nebbercracker's house when it spits out a carpet runner and attacks a pretty pigtailed girl (Spencer Locke) — who thereafter joins the boys with the disclaimer, "Normally I don't spend time with guys like you, but a house just tried to eat me."

Most of the dialogue (from screenwriters Dan Harmon, Rob Schrab and Pamela Pettler) is equally snappy, and Chowder is a gas. I could watch that kid all day; who cares if he's not real? Be warned that Monster House is as morbid and horrifying as it is funny — too horrifying, could be, for the tiniest movie goers. My three kids were frightened but not traumatized, and my youngest (almost 6) had to hide his face a few times. But everyone laughed, and everyone slept well: no nightmares.

I think I know why. Remember, for a moment, the Spielberg factor. Recall his insuppressible penchant for happy endings.

Monster House is full of menace, but none of it comes to fruition; in the end just one sorry person winds up dead and gone. I won't say who, but do yourself a favor and stay out of the basement. Even Spielberg can't save you there.