"Ghost Ship," starring Julianna Margulies and Gabriel Byrne, starts off pretty well, but the second half sinks with underdeveloped characters and confusing plot twists.
The movie opens during the 1960s on an opulent Italian ocean liner. It is evening, and the people are dancing and having a great time. Then, all of a sudden, gruesome murders and tragedies occur. All of the passengers are slaughtered in very disgusting and morbid ways, and the ship is never heard from again.
Then back to the present day. Murphy (Byrne) and Epps (Margulies) are part of a salvage team that finds old sunken ships in the ocean. According to law, the crew has the right to keep anything found in international waters -- "finders, keepers" and so on.
One afternoon after a successful recovery, the crew is propositioned by Ferriman (Desmond Harrington), who has recently found an abandoned ship near the Bering Strait. He wants the crew to rescue what is left of this seeming ocean liner, a find that could net him millions of dollars.
The crew, which also includes Dodge (Ron Eldard) and Greer (Isaiah Washington), deliberate over the prospective job and eventually decide to salvage it. Ferriman, since he found the ship, wants a share of the profit and also wants to travel with the crew to make sure he isn't ripped off.
While traveling to the site, the crew runs into nasty weather. Then, a strange object appears on the radar, only to vanish just as quickly. The crew accidentally smashes right into the massive ship as it continually disappears and reappears on their radar.
Murphy immediately recognizes the ship as the Italian ocean liner that has been lost for decades. The crew gets onboard and conducts an initial test of the ship's safety and damage. Dodge falls through some rusty flooring, and Epps and the other crew must save him. While pulling him back up, Epps sees a little girl standing on the lower deck of the ship.
This, of course, frightens Epps, for who expects to see little girls on a ship that has been abandoned for 40 years? But this is only the beginning of their problems. The crew also witnesses ghosts in the mirrors, cigarettes that are still smoking, dead bodies floating through doors and all-around creepiness.
Eventually, over $300 million in gold is found on board. The crew obviously decides to take the money and become ridiculously wealthy. But the demons, or whatever they are onboard, are not going to let them get away that easily. The crew's salvage boat "accidentally" blows up, stranding them on the haunted ocean liner.
The movie does a very fine job establishing the ethereal ambiance of the ship. It is definitely a freakish atmosphere, which supplies a fair amount of jumps and scares. That being said, the movie isn't really that scary. Sure, you'll jump a lot, but it doesn't have a lasting affect on you. You won't leave the theater with an eerie feeling, and you will definitely have no problem sleeping afterward.
One of the major reasons for the film's failure to scare people is its lack of believability. For instance, Epps, after being scared multiple times, decides to investigate the odd girl (Emily Browning) whom she sees everywhere. She goes alone and in the dark. Now, if you see scary things, obviously you stay with the group. You don't head off by yourself. Come on.
Also, Margulies' character is completely unemotional and unexciting. When she looks at drawings in the girl's room, the closet doors swing open to reveal the hanging carcass of the child. Instead of her screaming and running away, she acts calm and collected. Realistic? Not really. Margulies obviously made a great judgment call when she decided to leave "ER" to pursue movies like this.
In fact, all the characters in "Ghost Ship" lack depth and emotional development. Later in the film, it is revealed that Dodge harbors unrequited feelings for Epps. Who knew? It definitely wasn't made apparent to the audience. Not once, to my recollection, had he ever shown any sign of a romantic interest in her.
There is, however, one really incredible part of the movie. The scary girl allows Epps to see what really happened the night of the slaughtering over 40 years ago. What follows is an awesome montage scene, where the audience finds out who the bad guy actually is. After this part, however, the resolution is silly and confusing -- I still don't really understand what happened.
Another thing that shows lack of creativity is the tagline. "Sea Evil?" Please. It seems that the same person who gave up on the character development also gave up on the tagline. I'm not sure if the tagline is playing on the "Hear no evil, see no evil" slogan. I don't know, but "Cruise of Doom" would even have been better than "Sea Evil."
"Ghost Ship" is not a good horror film. In fact, it's actually pretty darn poor. Even with that understood, however, the interesting atmosphere that it evokes and the revealing montage scene salvages it from being a total shipwreck.
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