द फ्राइटनर्स

The Frighteners is a fun little movie from the mid-90s. It has an pleasing mix of stars who hit their stride in the 80s (Fox,Wallace, and Ermey) and others who count this as among their first works (Alvarado, Busey, McBride). It is an odd mix of horror and humor from Peter Jackson and had state-of-the-art special effects for the time.

The Frighteners, filmed and produced in New Zealand, was the biggest special effects movie made at that time outside the Hollywood movie base. It made extensive use of blue screens and had over 400 computer-enhanced special effects. Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh wrote the script and Jackson directed and produced the film.

The Frighteners has an overall tone of whimsy but also has some impressive horror movie moments. The Danny Elfman score fits the movie perfectly. Frank Bannister, played by Fox, is a widowed psychic investigator exploring supernatural goings on in a placid rural town. Newcomer Alvarado plays his romantic interest. Veteran actor John Astin plays a ghost called The Judge who has seen his better days. Ermey plays drill instructor (go figure), Sgt Hiles, who is in charge of the local cemetery. He has several lines and a general demeanor that pays homage or satirizes (depending on your viewpoint) his character in 1987's Full Metal Jacket. Jake Busey plays a good bad man, and McBride plays a funny role as Bannister's ghostly aide.

The Frighteners is amusing, frightening, entertaining, and a bit exhausting. It is a great Fall or Halloween movie.

I absolutely love this movie! It's a funny story with Michael Fox as the main character who can see ghosts. Three funny friendly ghosts talk to him regularly, hang out in his house & ride with him in his car. He's good friends with them & they help him drum up business. You see Michael advertises that he can rid a house of ghosts. When someone calls him thinking their house might be haunted he brings his ghosts with him on the first visit. The ghosts help Michael J. Fox by haunting the house while he's checking it out & writing an estimate. By the time he's done the owner is begging him to come back at any cost! It's really funny. The DVD is better. When I streamed it I noticed some scenes were cut out or shortened. I highly recommend.

What sets out to be a comedy movie with ghosts, (and anyone could be forgiven for thinking this is what it would be given that Michael J Fox has the lead) rapidly becomes a very dark supernatural thriller.

The special effects still look good even by todays standards, and the story is solidly written, good characters and good direction, there is not much to criticise in this movie.

The film itself is one that you should not miss, and certainly not because you think its something that it isn't.

8/10 A surprising film, that has probably been overlooked by too many movie lovers.

This one has received mixed Reviews. It's hard to imagine that anyone could be critical of the imagination that went into this entertaining, if overblown, Movie. It has enough energy and creativity for three Films. But it doesn't know when to quit. It just goes on and on, almost, but not quite, draining the fresh flourishes from the Film.

There are Artistic touches that impress and it looks very much like the Cartoony Movies that Jackson had made up to this point. But this may have suffered from too much Zemeckis and too much Money. The Director never needed a lot of Money to make Cool, Off-Beat, and Artistically rewarding Stuff.

Just one example, in the opening Scene we see an Evil Entity haunting a Women and it is shown protruding from behind walls and carpets. It is different and diabolical. But it won't be the last time this effect is used. Suffice to say that repetition is the bane of this really good Film.

There are Plots on top of Plots and not just in the Cemetery. It could be just a bit too much for some, and yet it is so charming that others may say, give me more.

After the traumatic experience of losing his beloved wife Debra (Angela Bloomfield) in a car accident, the architect Frank Bannister (Michael J. Fox) acquires the ability of seeing ghosts. He quits his profession; abandons the construction of his dream house to live with Debra and becomes a con man, using the ghosts Cyrus (Chi McBride), Stuart (Jim Fyfe) and The Judge (John Astin) to haunt houses and then charging the dwellers to exorcise their homes.

Dr. Lucy Lynskey (Trini Alvarado) visits the reclusive Patricia Ann Bradley (Dee Wallace-Stone), who was a former delinquent and girlfriend of the serial–killer Johnny Bartlett (Jake Busey) that lives with her mother, she notes that Patricia has bruises. Lucy returns home and together with her husband Ray Lynskey (Peter Dobson), they are haunted by a poltergeist. She calls Frank and soon Ray has a heart attack. Lucy meets Frank in a restaurant and he realizes that Soul Collector is marking numbers in the forehead of his victims before killing them. Frank becomes prime suspect of the police due to his knowledge about the murders and he is arrested. Meanwhile the psychotic FBI agent Milton Dammers (Jeffrey Combs) comes to the city to investigate the murder cases. When Frank finds that Lucy will be the next victim of the Reaper, he takes the ultimate decision to fight the entity to save her.

"The Frighteners" is a weird, but entertaining and original film by Peter Jackson. The story is too violent for comedy and too silly for horror; therefore the genre is indeed a combination of comedy, romance, horror and fantasy. The special effects are excellent and state-of-art for a 1996 movie. Michael J. Fox shines in the role of the psychic Frank Bannister and Trini Alvarado is perfect in the role of his romantic pair Dr. Lucy Lynskey. All the characters are interesting and peculiar, and the cast has great performances independently of the special effects. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Os Espíritos" ("The Spirits")