JOHN CARPENTER'S GHOSTS OF MARS A film review by David N. Butterworth Copyright 2001 David N. Butterworth
*1/2 (out of ****)
John Carpenter makes B-movies. Always has ("Halloween," "Escape from New York," "The Thing") and, by the looks of it ("They Live," "Escape from L.A.," "Vampires"), always will.
Carpenter's latest horror opus with a science fiction bent (or science fiction outing with a schlock horror bent) is the aptly-titled "John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars" (in case, I suppose, you went looking for someone else's "Ghosts of Mars"). Like all those films prefixed by the very possessive "John Carpenter's," "Ghosts of Mars" is an unashamed B-movie punctuated by a B-movie plot, B-movie actors, and B-movie special effects.
In category one, above, we have a storyline that borders on idiotic (and, at times, chaotic). Dormant Martians (i.e., swirling red gases) awakened by meddling humans possess the souls of hapless mining colonists rendering them testy Marilyn Manson lookalikes. All this explained (in flashback) to some grand Pooh-Bah counsel by Martian Police official Melanie Ballard (Natasha Henstridge, from the sub-"Species" films), the only returnee on a silly-looking train. Officer Ballard went in to bring back incarcerated felon James "Desolation" Williams; what she found was not a pretty picture.
In the second category we have Ms. Henstridge, her blonde hair pulled back tightly and awkwardly into a ponytail, Ice Cube (as the appropriately-named "Desolation"), Pam Grier (briefly, oddly--who wanted to work with whom I wonder?), and a host of extras all assuming that the story and special effects were going to carry this film and therefore they didn't need to try too hard.
In category number three we have, in addition to those swirling red gases and the silly-looking train, a couple of bird's-eye-view shots of a sprawling Martian metropolis (reddish also). State-of-the-art special effects have never been a Carpenter trademark and once again the writer/director (who seems to have no problem finding work, however) doesn't waste any of the film's budget in that department.
"Ghosts of Mars" is lock, laughing stock, and barrel all your standard Carpenter fare: dingy interiors, cluttered exteriors, inane dialogue, lots of leather, scarred, crazed-looking aliens, and lots and lots of weaponry. The film often and always explodes into warfare without warning--spontaneously, stupidly. Carpenter might like to think he's made a western here but it's a western without any real heroes, villains, or border conflicts. It's just the shootouts minus a hissing Snake Plissken. I never thought I'd miss the guy but I do.
It's not *all* the same, however. Dubbed the "one-note wonder" for his minimalist music soundtracks, Carpenter seems to have graduated from simplistic (yet effective) scoring by highlighting his action with loud, screeching guitar work. Fortunately this drowns out a lot of the dialogue. The final exchange between Henstridge and, er, Cube though is both audible *and* priceless.
Mars has proven an infertile breeding ground for Hollywood in the last year or so, what with the stillborn "Mission to Mars" and "Red Planet" (with Val Kilmer). "Ghosts of Mars" sadly adds to those disappointing returns (in its opening weekend it was overshadowed by a bunch of sequels, among them "American Pie 2" and "Rush Hour 2"). The irony is that the Mars in Carpenter's film feels sadly absent. There are occasional references to the red planet, of course, but the film might as well have been set in Perth Amboys than on earth's closest neighbor.
Two things keep "John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars" from getting a huge slap upside the head. 1. Henstridge keeps her top on (miraculously), and 2. the film doesn't pretend to be anything it's not. What that means, however, is that fans of superior, intelligent, grade A sci-fi/horror are singularly out of luck.
-- David N. Butterworth dnb@dca.net
Got beef? Visit "La Movie Boeuf" online at http://members.dca.net/dnb
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