Rewind: Ghost Ship (2002)
Potential Alternate Titles: Titanic 2, The Interdimensionally Imperfect Storm, Julianna Margulies Sees Dead People
I always confused Ghost Ship with Thir13en Ghosts and the House on Haunted Hills Have Eyes remake (or was it a reboot?), and can be forgiven for such since they all came out around 2000 and all consume copious amounts of monkey balls. However, Ghost Ship is uniquely disappointing due to the wonderful premise it so casually squanders.
The film starts with an instantly surprising come-hither retro deliciousness, telling the tale of a doomed 1960s ocean liner. There's style, gore and a splendid moment of suspense. Once the scene is set, it jumps forward to present day, reassuring the audience that this is a balls-out adventure flick starring Gabriel "Keaton" Byrne and Karl "Éomer" Urban, crewmen of the civilian tugboat Arctic Warrior. Of course, they stumble upon the enormous ghost ship and decide to board it and take a look around, an unbelievably dangerous undertaking for such a tiny pirate organization, malevolent paranormal presence aside.
SIDENOTE #1: My favorite part of Avatar is when Jake Sully tentacle-rapes a Pterodactyl. Lucky for him that flying this massive beast is basically akin to playing a video game that responds to verbal commands like "fly straight." The force is strong with this one.
So between spooky, sometimes fatal encounters, the crew discovers gold in dem hills and decides to make off with it... until their tugboat blows up. The ghost ship is now their only ship. At this point, the following questions Dougie'd across my mind: What kind of movie is this? A well-paced retro ghost story? An
excavation actioner? Perhaps neither at all. Maybe just a movie about
people milling around an old boat. But what the hell
happened on the boat anyway? Multiple unrelated disasters? A
gold-napping scheme gone array? Should a movie called Ghost Ship really
be asking itself this many questions? I only care 'cuz it started out so promisingly.
SIDENOTE #2: I'm so sick of Angelina Jolie walking around like she's hot sh*t. F*ck you. You and Bono can go blow each other in the desert while wearing your super humble scarves.
Must the entire cast split up? Must the ghosts be familiar with the intimate
details of their lives? Must they each be subjected to scenarios
specifically designed to facilitate their demise by manipulating them
via their darkest fears, flaws or desires? Must we, the audience, force ourselves to ignore blatant lifts from The Shining and The Lost Boys? Apparently so. About 2/3 of the way through, we finally get some backstory, and that's a green light for the dastardly gold-napping scheme, wherein hundreds of innocent ocean liner passengers are murdered in a myriad of ways by the most obvious of culprits... waiters. F*cking waiters. This flashback constitutes another sophisticated sequence in an otherwise terrible movie.
The Big Twist: One of the protagonists is an otherworldly immortal soul collector? Julianna blows the ship up in a giant fireball of death, but somehow survives? The good (!?!) ghosts of the titular ghost ship are saved by said explosion, as is Julianna, who winds up safe in an ambulance, only to AH, F*CK IT.
The Verdict: I didn't want to have to say it, but two brief segments aside, Ghost Ship is Ghost Sh*t. See what I did there?
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