Rating: 2/5
Hooptober 6.0 | 27/32 | Dee Wallace | Countries 5/6 | New Zealand
In the town of (not) Lyttelton, people are dying in droves. Each person suffers a heart condition, but their body shows no sign of heart issues.
Frank Bannister is a Psychic Investigator. He’s also a fraud, but not in the way you expect. Frank can communicate with the dead but doesn’t exorcise ghosts from houses. Instead, he has a cadre of ghosts that he hires to pretend to haunt a house so he can exorcise it for a fee.
Dr. Lucy Lynskey and her husband, Ray, are the latest of Frank’s targets because Frank drove over their fence and didn’t want to pay for it. But after Frank does his song-and-dance, he sees mysterious numbers on Ray’s head.
Soon, Ray is dead. Frank keeps seeing numbers on people’s foreheads, each higher than the last. Afterward, the person dies. The trouble is that people keep spotting Frank with the recently deceased. They suspect him to be the killer.
The film uses a LOT of CGI. For the cartoonish effects, however, it makes sense.
I liked this movie until the ghosts showed up. They’re so lame, and they talk a lot. The movie consistently stops in its tracks for a ghost to show off a ghost effect.
Michael J. Fox’s character is so mean-spirited. I get it — he’s washed up and depressed because of his wife, but give us something to root for!
The script is also gross. There’s a scene where a ghost tries to fuck a mummy. “I like it when they lie still like that.”
The story is so obvious that waiting for the characters to catch up is exhausting.
Danny Elfman’s score is fun!
I was happy to see Jeffrey Combs being a big old weirdo. This is the closest I’ve seen him act like Jim Carrey.
Dee Wallace plays the girlfriend of a dead serial killer. That’s all I’ll say.
Overall, the effects are sharp. Despite the story’s potential, watching it was a bad time. If I had seen this as a kid, I might have liked it more.
Not enough Melanie Lynskey!
This has the worst cover of “Don’t Fear the Reaper” performed by some New Zealand band called The Mutton Birds.