John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars Review
by Jerry Saravia (faust668 AT aol DOT com)February 25th, 2002
GHOSTS OF MARS (2001)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
February 25th, 2001
RATING: 3 stars
The great John Carpenter film awaits a cinema near you. "Halloween," "Assault on Precinct 13" and "Starman" were a few stellar examples but mostly we have been saddled with fascinating experiments like "In The Mouth of Madness," "The Thing" and grave disappointments like "Prince of Darkness" and "Vampires." And like it or not, Carpenter knows how to use his resources to stir and entertain when he does it right. "Ghosts of Mars" is no classic by any stretch of the imagination but it is a marked improvement over "Vampires" and has some nifty ideas and fun performances.
Essentially a western taking place on the planet Mars, we have Lt. Melanie Ballard (Natasha Henstridge) and other members of a police force including Commander Helena Braddock (Pam Grier) and Bashira Kincaid (Clea Duvall) as they travel by train to some mining colony where a supposedly notorious killer, "Destination" Williams, is being held (played by Ice Cube, who continues to surprise me in every film role). Oh, lest we forget there is a male in this small police force played by Jason Statham ("Snatch") who makes sexual remarks to Lt. Ballard at his every convenience. Meanwhile, just as Ballard's force is ready to take Williams and bring him to justice, a force is unleashed that awakens Martian warriors who love to decapitate humans and shout as loudly as Ozzy Osbourne. These ghosts have the ability of taking over the minds of the miners on this colony and all hell breaks loose. Lots of gunfire and karate kicks ensue.
"Ghosts of Mars" should not be mistaken for an intellectual sci-fi film but rather an in-your-face action melodrama with lots of special effects. One of the best effects scenes takes place when an archaeologist, Professor Whitlock (Joanna Cassidy), crash lands on the possessed colony in her air balloon. I also love all the train scenes since they are the quietest scenes in the movie, allowing us to explore the characters' personalities and interaction. For a while, the film aims to be a character-oriented update of "Assault on Precinct 13" by way of Howard Hawks's "Rio Bravo" but when the action scenes start, they take over the movie and become the focus. Nothing wrong with that though I never really thought of Carpenter as an action director, despite his "Escape to New York." His talent lies in horror and some scenes inside the mines made me jump.
On a fundamental level, "Ghosts of Mars" is lots of fun to watch and has commanding actors at the forefront (though I found it cruel to see Duvall and Grier given such short-shrift in their roles). Henstridge plays a woman of authority and strong will and Ice Cube gets to show what a continuingly strong presence he has on screen - both characters could stand on their own as the leads of a movie. Maybe in the sequel.
For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at http://moviething.com/members/movies/faust/JATMindex.shtml
E-mail me with any questions, comments or general complaints at [email protected] or at [email protected]
More on 'John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars'...
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
