Ghost ship, ghastly SXXte
 Jan 27th, 2003
Advantages:
Some genuinely scary moments
Disadvantages:
The second half of the film, some of the acting .
Recommendable:
Yes
Detailed rating:
Did you enjoy it?
Story
Characters / Performances
Special Effects
How does it compare to similar films?
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  markysay
About me:
Member since:23.01.2003
Reviews:3
Members who trust:1
Review rated by 24 Ciao members on average: very helpful 
First of all apologies about the title, it's really not that bad. In fact, if you have nothing else to do with your Sunday night it’s actually quite entertaining. Usually before I go to see a film I like to know a little about it, like who stars in it, who directed it, and the general consensus, is it any good? I have only recently discovered ciao!, and I thought I would read a few Ghost Ship reviews before I set out, unfortunately there was none, so here I am writing the first one!
So in the cinema, most of the other films I have already seen, ghost ship starts in 5 minutes. Ghost Ship it is. So I still don’t know who made the film, the director or producer, I didn’t catch their names on the credits, but the film is in the Alien style, although I’m pretty sure Ridley Scott didn’t direct this!
The opening credits are slightly misleading, they try to convince the viewer that they are watching a light-hearted
film, with a bouncy-fluffy font for the text and an Italian(I presume) woman dressed in red singing an Italian song. From this point the film could just have easily been called Love Boat. Following this surprisingly pleasant intro comes perhaps one of the most gruesome starts to a film I have seen. I wont give it away to those of you who haven’t seen it but it involves a steel cable. After the gory opening that I will say no more about, we are introduced to the main cast. Lead by Usual Suspect Gabriel Byrne, who are a salvage crew, that reclaim sunken ships for a living.
Our crew are propositioned by a pilot to recover an ocean liner, missing since 1962, which could be worth millions. The first hour or so into the expedition is a decent attempt at a jump out of your seat supernatural thriller, it had me jumping a few times, with some genuinely “jumpy” moments.(note over use of the word jump)
There is a point however when you start to think, hang on a minute I’ve been here before, and the plot goes from, enjoyable edge of the seat stuff to, a little bit ridiculous. I know how this sounds in writing and it’s really not that bad, but you will be walking away cursing the ending. Think Jeepers Creepers for instance! You will discuss with your friends as I did, and will come up with a thousand different endings which would have produced a better film.
The acting in this film, may be described by many as “not quite first rate” but an actor is only as good as the script so perhaps this can be forgiven. Byrne as I’m sure we all know can act, and can act well (if u have seen the Usual Suspects) and he plays the skipper of the Arctic tug boat. The rest of the cast make a decent attempt, but there are a few scenes, which should really have been refilmed before the film was released, and watching the film you will probably be able to spot them. As the title implies this is a ghost ship, but maybe not the kind of ghost you may expect, the film takes a turn for the worse as the plot twist unfolds. And chances are you will not see this twist coming, I didn’t see it coming at all, but don’t get your hopes up, this is no Fight Club or Sixth Sense, and you'd probably end up wishing it was simething different.
The music wasn’t memorable really memorable, and it’s not a score you would rush out to buy, like the score to Hannibal or The Thin Red Line, which I saw the films and had to buy (the soundtrack is not by Hans Zimmer incidentally). Although the “scary” bits are set up rather nicely by appropriate music. This is always good, as it helps me brace myself for the inevitable shock to come! The sets were good, it really looked like the crew were on an aged ocean liner, and the effects were also good, nothing on the scale of titanic however but, the boat looked good. I’m not sure how much was computer graphics and how much was actually built, but I know for a fact that they did not build an exact replica!
You will like this film if you like films such as Alien, Thirteen Ghosts, Sphere and other similar films. Perhaps Alien is the odd one out (it was successful), but those were the vibes I got from watching. This film wont win any awards for being good, and should also miss out on a turkey of the year award, although the ending lets it down.
As a whole the film was enjoyable, easy to watch, no complicated sub-plots to understand, just a standard, horror/thriller type film to help pass the weekend away. There are plenty of other films out which are better namely Gangs of New York and Lord of the Rings2, but if your not into all that epic stuff and you just want to watch a “normal” length film then go for this!
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by (4%):
26.02.2004 23:13
The best parts i liked were, when the metal wire cut everybody in the Ball room & when the 2 blokes chewed on Maggots in the illusion of food. Did make me puke then. jedi_kickass ( ' _ ' )
01.09.2003 15:44
Yep - amusingly gory opening scene then downhill from there in. Sxxte describes it well.
05.02.2003 00:12
Great op. x