Ghost Ship (2002) Movie Review
Written by: ML
Edited By: Grave Reviews Staff
Film Information
Director: Steve Beck
Producers: Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis, Susan Levin
Writers: Mark Hanlon, John Pogue
Date Released: October 25, 2002
Cast:
Gabriel Byrne as Sean Murphy
Julianna Margulies as Maureen Epps
Ron Eldard as Dodge
Desmond Harrington as Jack Ferriman
Isaiah Washington as Greer
Alex Dimitriades as Santos
Karl Urban as Munder
Emily Browning as Katie Harwood
Francesca Rettondini as Francesca
Rating = 3/5 Graves
***May contain some spoilers***
Synopsis
The story begins in 1962 when wealthy passengers aboard a luxury cruise ship Antonia Graza were having a good time until a wire cord kills everyone except a little girl. 40 years later, a crew of boat salvagers was encouraged to go to the location of a drifting ship. Turns out, this is the Antonia Graza, declared lost for decades. They explored the ship and the ghost girl named Katie showed herself to Epps. They found dead bodies and other weird stuff but the boxes of gold were the main attraction. They prepare to get off the ship but their salvage boat was destroyed, killing Santos in the process. They plan to repair the ship and one by one gets killed by ghosts. Turns out, Jack Ferriman was a salvager of souls and he is using the ship and the gold to lure people and take their souls to reach his quota. Epps had no choice but to sink the ship, killing Ferriman. The souls trapped in the ghost ship were released along with Katie.
Gore Factor
The opening sequence is already filled with blood and gore. Cruise ship passengers getting sliced by a thin wire makes it not an ordinary ghost story. There are very few jump scares and more on killing. Some of the notable ones are Greer’s nasty elevator fall, Munder getting grinded into the ship’s gears, and the entire flashback scene where the deaths of the luxury ship passengers were revealed such as the use of rat poison in the food, Francesca’s hooked face, and Katie’s hanging skeleton. Also, one disgusting scene was when Dodge and Munder were eating maggots.
The Grave Review
The movie had a huge start but the exploration of the ship was a slow burn. There are irrelevant scenes such as the ones in the laundry room, meat storage, and the maggots in a can. The death scenes of Murphy and Dodge were not shown but they focused on Greer’s seduction sequence. It’s not until past the 1-hour mark that the story began its true action. It took a long time for the characters to realize that they have to get off the ship.
Everything about the ship is a mystery until the major plot twist where the man who told them about the ship was revealed to be a crazed soul collector from hell. The ship must trap a certain number of souls before it goes back to the so-called management. Desmond Harrington’s acting is so insane that audiences would not expect the turn of events.
Since the climax and resolution happened near the ending, it seemed abrupt especially with the lone survivor plot. It came full circle when the new ship was loaded with the crates of gold and the eye contact with the soul collector himself which meant another round of killings.
Overall, this movie worked well in terms of getting the audiences hooked. The sliced bodies from the beginning are something to hold on to up until the ending. All thanks to the flashback, there is some closure to that thirst for knowing.
For the foregoing reasons, Grave Reviews gives Ghost Ship (2002) three graves out of five graves.
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