Overall Rating
  Awesome: 14.5%
Worth A Look: 12.21%
Average: 6.11%
Pretty Bad: 22.9%
Total Crap: 44.27%
4 reviews, 107 user ratings
|
|
| 13 Ghosts (2001) |
by Scott Weinberg
"The original was crappy. This one is not an improvement."
|
I can only assume that 13 Ghosts is the result of some profoundly twisted Hollywood wager. There's no other way to explain how such a moronic movie could ever get released.So already I'm sick to death of these haunted house remakes. In terms of pure cinematic wretchedness, the sub-genre has now gone three for three. A few years back, moviegoers were subjected to a remake of The Haunting, a film so bad that it made my retinas go on strike. Not content with the sheer stink that permeated from that film, producers quickly released an update of The House on Haunted Hill. While not nearly as bad as The Haunting, this film was notable in that it also sucked. Really bad.
So since this idea has already belly-flopped twice, it's only logical that we now have another one. Inspired by William Castle's 1960 original film, 13 Ghosts tells the tale of...well, ghosts. Over a dozen of 'em. Now let's not mistake the original for anything of quality. Produced by "gimmick king" William Castle, the original 13 Ghosts suffers from dreary pacing and an uninteresting screenplay. It's not a good film. But at least it didn't star Matthew Lillard and Shannon Elizabeth.
Unfortunately, the remake does.
For those interested in plots that can be described in two words, here we go:
Haunted House.
Any other plot description would afford the screenwriters infinitely more credit than they deserve. On one hand, we have a handful of dumb human beings. On the other, we have a bunch of ghosts, mostly in cameo appearances. That's pretty much it. A few people die, but most (unfortunately) do not. Of course there's a whole lot of "plot pretense", which boils down to a bunch of actors spouting nonsense babble/plot exposition, but a 'cohesive story' is about as evident as Nell Carter's navel.
The humans running about the corridors are a sad-sack Dad, his teenage daughter, an annoying young tot, a rabid drooling ghost hunter, a sexy female ghost hunter...and the obligatory black servant-type. If someone were to ask you to finish the sequence A,B,C,_,_,_ , the resulting solution would be infinitely more surprising than any of this film's plot contrivances.
Of course the house was owned by a kooky old uncle. Of course the annoying ghost hunter and slimy lawyer are going to earn their gruesome fates, and of course most of the characters are going to survive. This is a Hollywood horror flick, after all. If you consider dry Saltines a "tasty treat", then you may find something new in this film.
The ghost attacks are directed in full-on MTV fashion, and the resulting sequences are more likely to cause massive migraines than anything resembling a good jolt. The apparitions are presented in split-second edits in an effort to make them seem more shocking. These attempts fail. The movie overall seems like it was edited with a broken weed-whacker, and the pacing can best be described as molasses-esque. Even considering that it's nothing more than a silly horror movie, 13 Ghosts is an unqualified disaster.
But then throw Matthew Lillard (The Curve) and Shannon Elizabeth (Tomcats) into the mix, and what you have is an unqualified mess that will be forever remembered as the World Series of Pathetic Actors. Lillard stomps around and froths at the mouth. You know, his standard "vein-in-the-forehead" delivery. Shannon Elizabeth prances about with a smug little grin, obviously content in the knowledge that adolescent boys consider her breasts the next Meryl Streep. I don't pick actors at random to bash. These are among the least entertaining "young actors" out there, and to cast them both in the same film is an offense on par with the pairing of Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze.
The remaining cast looks uniformly sheepish, as if they just wanna "say the words and cash the check". Tony Shalhoub (Quick Change) does the best he can with the role of "confused Dad who screams 'Bobby' a lot" and comely actress Embeth Davidtz (Army of Darkness) is a little fun as a no-nonsense ghost-smasher. F. Murray Abraham (Amadeus) proves once again that he'll appear in any movie, any time, no matter what. Abraham wisely chose the smallest role posible.
With quality original ghost stories (such as The Others) being released these days, there's literally no reason for moviegoers to have interest in warmed-up slop like 13 Ghosts. If the idea of watching unappealing actors wander through empty glass hallways for 90 consecutive minutes sounds like fun to you, here's the year's best film.If you're going to remake a weak old ghost movie, you could at LEAST find a way to improve upon it. Just because it's a remake, that doesn't mean the suckiness needs to be retained.
link directly to this review at http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=4749&reviewer=128
originally posted: 11/13/01 13:20:01
![[printer]](/images/icon/printer.gif) printer-friendly format
|
Horror Remakes: For more in the Horror Remakes series, click here.
|
 |
USA
26-Oct-2001 (R)
UK
N/A
Australia
13-Dec-2001
|
|
Articles 
subscribe to this feed![[AllPosters.com]](/images/icon/ap.gif){kind=icon}
