Ghost Town (2008)

December 24, 2008

Airline Broadcast, Seattle, WA to Newark, NJ

** 1/2 / ****

First Half * ½ / ****

Second Half *** ½ / ****

By Scott Muoio

“What happens matters,” sighs Tea Leoni’s Gwen when confronted by Ricky Gervais’ Bertram Pincus regarding love, infidelity, and moving on. But should we care? That is the cruxt of the film and turning point of the generic Ghost Town, a movie that semi-effectively melds Ghost and It’s a Wonderful Life with silly sit-com humour. The result: a halfway rewarding film that never quite gels enough to completely win us over.

Gervais plays Bertram Pincus, a nebbish dentist who despises interaction with humankind. When his patients tell him about their personal lives Pincus shoves gauze in their mouths. When his neighbors scramble for his attention to hold the elevator he turns his head and presses the “Close Door” button.

Discourteous to the max it may seem that Pincus hates his fellow man but that’s not really it. More accurately, it’s that Pincus can’t be bothered with their antics and is content living a life of quiet solitude without ever having to deal with them.

The first half of the film provides us with glimpses into Pincus’ everyday snubs while establishing the movie’s macguffin. After a semi-botched colonoscopy, Pincus awakens from his “seven minutes of death” to an odd state of purgatory. While everything in his life is the same Pincus now has the ability to, here it comes… see… dead… people. And wouldn’t you know it, once said dead people discover that Pincus can see them everyone in town lines up hoping to use the grouchy curmudgeon as their medium.

Greg Kinear plays Frank, a recently deceased womanizer desperate for Pincus’ help to save his still living ex-wife (Tea Leoni) from marrying another low life like himself. Desperate to avoid the needy ghosts, Pincus accepts Frank’s peculiar offer: Frank will keep the ghosts at bay while Pincus moves in to court his ex-wife. Odd, indeed.

It is shortly into this courtship where Leoni’s Gwen utters the line, “everything matters,” altering the film from goofy comedy to serious melodrama. It is also the point where I went from thinking Ghost Town was a boring, misguided comedy to a surprisingly emotional and reaffirming bittersweet affair. Suddenly the out of place Gervais had real power with his acting, the same sort of sad sack revelatory aesthetic he made famous as David Brent in the outstanding British television program, The Office. Meanwhile, my female counterpart, who was enjoying the movie up to that point, had her own change of heart. “Too sappy, too silly, and just too much” she chastised as I revealed my appreciation for the film’s second half.

I was flabbergasted. Could it be that we have another Big Fish on our hands, the Tim Burton film that enchanted men with its heart-wrenching second half while turning women off for exactly the same reason? The immediate evidence was overwhelming. Where I was bored by Ghost Town’s first half, wondering why people who see ghosts in movies always waste their time trying to get the girl rather than sharing their humanity changing discovery with the rest world, my female counterpart was caught up in the sketch comedy hi-jinx. And when I finally took the leap during the film’s second half she started looking at her watch and humming songs from Mama Mia! Good grief.

So what is the final word on Ghost Town? Well, for some, like me, I suspect the film’s first half is a 1 ½ star effort while the second is 3 ½ out of 4. For others, I imagine, it is exactly the opposite. Therefore, this cut and dry dichotomy can lead to only one conclusion: I doubt you’d miss much if you never saw this film.

Bottom line: There are better, funnier, more emotional ghost stories than Ghost Town. See them instead.

Director: David Koepp

Producer: Gavin Palone

Writer: David Koepp, John Kamps

Starring: Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear, Tea Leoni, Aasif Mandvi, Billy Campbell, Alan Ruck, Kristen Wiig