Ghost Son (2007) Reviews

• The Father, the Son and the unholy DULL spirit.

  Coventry2007-10-04

  "Ghost Son" is Lamberto Bava's best film and, at the same time, also his worst. I suppose that statement requires some slight clarification. It's his best because it's well directed, ambitious, accessible and very stylish, but his worst because it's a dull, unoriginal movie and undeniably a huge letdown to all the real fans of Bava's past efforts. Let's face it: many fans, myself certainly included, wouldn't have been interested in this film judging by the plot, the famous names attached to it and even the boring sounding title. The only motivation here was Lamberto Bava, who brought us large amounts of convoluted Gialli and fun splatter films in the past. "Ghost Son" is a bit of his comeback film, alongside "The Torturer", and although the latter definitely isn't a good film, it at least lives up to his fans' lines of expectations, with excessive amounts of sleaze, blood and sadism. "Ghost Son" is a weak and intolerably soft horror film, even talking in terms of mainstream ghost stories. The emphasis lies too much on sentimentality, and this badly affects the already limited number of horrific & creepily atmospheric moments. The basic premise might feature one or two potentially good ideas, but the film is overall dull and far too clichéd. John Hannah and Laura Harring star as a happy couple, living on a remote ranch in South Africa and breeding horses for a living. The joy and happiness couldn't possibly improve, so naturally something tragic is bound to happen, and it does. Mark dies in a car accident, but the inconsolable Stacey remains at the ranch where she's in constant contact with Mark's spirit. She even gets pregnant with his child, but shortly after baby Martin's birth mysterious events begin to occur. It seems as if Mark's restless and selfish ghost 'possessed' the baby and uses him to encourage Stacy into committing suicide. With all the focus on the couple's relationship, many of the events and sub plots are underdeveloped and/or remains unexplained, like the whole background of the youthful maid Thandi. There's too little action and the only real fright-moments are too obviously borrowed from classic films such as "The Exorcist" and "Rosemary's Baby" (vomiting green goo, self moving furniture…). Purely talking in terms of horrific entertainment "Ghost Son" is a painful misfire, but it has to be said, it's a beautiful and enchanting looking failure. The cinematography is extremely elegant and many camera angles are truly inventive and suggestive. The moody score sometimes even manages to create an ominous atmosphere even though there's nothing of any significance happening on screen. There are several beautiful images of the South African wildlife to admire but, if that interests you, I suppose you're better off watching National Geographic instead. Not much to recommend here. Fans of atmosphere-driven ghost stories have much better options to choose from and die-hard Bava fanatics are advised to (re-)watch "Demons", "Macabre" or "Blade in the Dark".

• Look who has returned to the horror-scene...

  Vomitron_G2007-05-24

  Now this, I really consider to be Lamberto Bava's international comeback-movie (instead of his previous lower budget effort, THE TORTURER, in 2005). You gotta hand it to the man: Coming back to the theatrical world of horror with an Italian/South African/Spanish/British co-production. And you know what? To my utmost surprise, it's even pretty decent (I saw this one before I saw THE TORTURER later this week, so you can imagine how unpleasant a surprise the latter was….). It's even hard to believe that GHOST SON and THE TORTURER were both directed by the very same director. GHOST SON looks great! The cinematography looks astonishing. And Bava really took the time to direct this one. And he clearly had a very comfortable budget to work with (it always helps to have the money to afford a capable and talented crew). Almost every shot in this movie has movement (travel-shots, letting the camera slowly and stylishly turn around the actors, crane shots,….). It was a lust for the eye to see Bava finally being able to show his more technical directing skills again. The story, on the other hand is a hit and miss deal again. I liked the fact that Bava is giving us a different take on your average ghost story. But while the movie manages to be effectively scary at some points, it also had quite some ridiculous, but highly entertaining events in it (a baby with a boner biting his mother's boobie????). Nevertheless, these events, to me, were extremely fun to watch (still too bad they damaged the over-all 'seriousness' of this movie a bit, though). All-in-all, Ghost Son is a slow mover, but story-wise it did managed to keep my interest because I wanted to know to where it would all lead to, eventually (just don't expect any exciting twists or surprising conclusion to it because the denouement isn't exactly a spectacular climax). In a world filled with horror-movies containing derivative surprise-twists at the end, Ghost Son manages to simply avoid that trap. Rather rare these days, I'd say. But it was really the more than decent cinematography and Bava's skill-full directing that kept my going through this movie. Well, it even has more merits, of course. Like the good acting by Laura Harring and the adequate musical score. Not to forget Pete Postlethwaite's noticeable presence in this one. I'm fully aware of the fact that a lot of people might not like this one as much as I did. Some people even might say THE TORTURER is a better movie. I say: Don't believe them, because it's not... but that's totally up to you, of course.

• Weird Ghost Story

  claudio_carvalho2007-07-04

  Stacey (Laura Harring) and Mark (John Hannah) have recently married and are deeply in love for each other, living in Mark's farm in Africa. When Mark has a fatal car accident, the widow Stacey misses him and decides to stay with their orphan teenager maid Thandi (Mosa Kaiser) in the farm. Later, her friend and doctor Doc (Peter Postlethwaite) finds that Stacey is pregnant of Mark. After a complicated delivery, Stacey notes that her baby in some moments seems to be possessed by the spirit of Mark, trying to kill her to bring her to spend the eternity with Mark. Lamberto Bava is the son of the great Italian director of horror movies Mario Bava, and directed the cult "Demons" and "Demons 2". Based on these samples of his filmography, I bought "Ghost Son" expecting to see a scary and creepy horror movie. Unfortunately, my expectation was only satisfied in brief moments and I can list some reasons. First, there is no previous development of the key characters of Mark and Stacey and their love, inclusive for a better explanation of the motives of the ghost of Mark trying to bring Stacey to stay with him. The creepy and mysterious Thandi, who insists that lives with her mother that died when she was five years old, is simply wasted along the narrative. I expected to see her mother, but she is simply ignored and limited to be another lie of Thandi. The baby boy recalls "Chucky" in some moments, and Doc is completely stupid, at least not noticing that Stacey has had at least a nervous breakdown. In spite of the flaws in the screenplay, there are some creepy scenes along this film, which could be better and better based on the cast. My vote is six. Title (Brazil): "Mensagem do Além" ("Message From Beyond")

• I don't love you any more

  Abominog2006-11-02

  Alas, it seems that the golden times of stylish Italian cinema have sunk into oblivion. And the recent brainchild of celebrated filmmaker Lamberto Bava is yet another obvious proof to that assumption. I felt lucky to watch many films from this prolific director (like Body Puzzle, Delerium, Macabre and both Demons). Albeit not entirely satisfying they have never been that dull. A suspicion that this new entry to my DVD collection was money thrown to the winds arose shortly in the aftermath of the car crash scene exhibiting an awkward and unlikely position of the body under the flip-over car. And the sense of shallowness grew up in the course of the ponderously narrated chain of events that followed. Dumb dialogs, suspenseless script and a total waste of talents from the international cast. The only character that provided more or less passable performance was the mischievous Mark's son juicing up the entire boredom. Unfortunately, Mario's son job on all accounts could hardly be hailed. I look forward to seeing his Murder House hopefully expected to be an improvement.

• Ghost Son seemed to materialize out of nowhere

  bigdarvick2009-02-10

  I was strolling through a flea market and found this DVD in a bin for 5 bucks. It looked interesting. I wasn't quite sure what the film had in store for me and I didn't pay attention to the cast, director etc as I would for most horror films. I just liked the cover art, which has gotten me into trouble in the past with notable bombs such as Brotherhood of Blood, ReVamped and other bad ones. I fall for the artwork. This film, although slow and dragging in some spots, delivered some full fledged--top to bottom, spine chills. The "creep factor" in this movie scored with a bullet and had me squirming on my couch. Admittedly, I knew little about the director of this film, but I knew that it had an Italian crew behind it and in my humble opinion, they did a nice job. It was just an unusual story and a well made film. My wife got up and walked out on it because it upset her and believe me, it will upset and scare you at the same time. A well shot, acted and produced film. Plus, the star of this movie was someone I had never seen before and my first impression was that she was a talentless hot bod. Wrong on the talentless aspect, right on the hot bod. She was convincing and a capable actor. I give this film "7 hail Mary's."