Happy Halloween! Here are ten of my favorite movie ghosts. (NOTE: Some of these have inferior remakes — stick with the originals.)
Topper Cary Grant and Constance Bennett are the most sophisticated, witty, and glamorous ghosts ever in this delightful comedy about a young couple who are killed in a car accident and come back as ghosts to brighten the life of a shy banker.
The Uninvited Ray Milland and Ruth Hussey play a brother and sister who move into a house on a Cornwall cliff. It turns out someone is already living there — a ghost. This movie introduced the jazz standard “Stella by Starlight.”
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir A ghost romance? Gene Tierney and Rex Harrison play the title roles in this story of a widow who moves into a house inhabited by the ghost of a handsome sea captain.
The Canterville Ghost Margaret O’Brien teaches her distant cousin Robert Young about noblesse oblige when American troops are bivouacked a her family’s ancestral home. It turns out their mutual ancestor is staying there, too, a ghost (Charles Laughton) who has to show some courage before he can go to heaven.
Ghostbusters Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, and Ernie Hudson battle a number of ectoplasmic manifestations in this classic comedy (soon to be remade with an all-female team).
13 Ghosts People often ask me if I’ve ever walked out of a movie. The answer is: just once, and it was this movie when I was 9. I was a little freaked out by the special glasses you had to wear to see the ghosts, but it was when the Ouija board pointer was lifted off the board by a ghost that I turned to my mother and said, “I have to go home now.” I’ve since developed real affection for all of William Castle’s films, including this one.
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is my favorite Christmas story and I love just about every version, but I think the best is the one starring Alistair Sim.
Pirates of Caribbean: Curse of Black Pearl “You best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner… you’re in one!” Geoffrey Rush is the ghost captain of a pirate ship with a ghost crew in this rollicking adventure inspired by the Disney theme park ride.
The Ghost and Mr. Chicken Don Knotts is the nervous aspiring reporter assigned to spend the night in a haunted house. Or is it?
The Haunting Julie Harris stars in this classic of psychological horror about investigators who spend the night in a haunted house.
Last week’s release of Charlie St. Cloud, with Zac Efron as a young man who visits every day with the ghost of his younger brother, made me think of some of my favorite movie ghosts. What are yours?
1. “The Ghost and Mrs. Muir” A young widow (the exquisite Gene Tierney) finds her new home haunted by the ghost of a handsome sea captain (Rex Harrison) in this bittersweet romance that inspired a 1960’s television series.
2. “Ghost” The late Patrick Swayze played a ghost trying to help his girlfriend (Demi Moore) identify the man responsible for his murder with the help of a medium surprised to find out she is not a fake (an Oscar-winning performance from Whoopi Goldberg).
3. “Portrait of Jennie” A young artist (Joseph Cotten) has a series of mysterious encounters with Jennie, who inspires him to create the title work of art. When he first sees her, she is a child, wearing the clothes and remembering incidents of a generation before. But over a period of months he sees her again, each time several years older than the last until she is a beautiful young woman (Jennifer Jones) and he finds himself falling in love with her.
4. “Truly Madly Deeply” Juliet Stevenson gives a radiant performance in this story of a woman devastated by loss who is overjoyed at first to be haunted by the ghost of the man she loved (Alan Rickman).
5. “The Sixth Sense” Bruce Willis is a therapist trying to help a young boy (Haley Joel Osment) who “sees dead people” in this haunting drama with a legendary twist.
6. “Heart and Souls” Four souls with unfinished business become guardians of a baby born as their bus crashed. When he grows up (played by Robert Downey, Jr.) they enlist his help in resolving the issues that have kept them from entering heaven.
7. “The Unforgiven” A brother and sister (Ray Milland and Ruth Hussey) move into a mysterious abandoned house by the sea, even though their dog refuses to cross the property line. It turns out the place is haunted and a tangled story has to be revealed to prevent another murder. This was one of the first non-comedy ghost stories produced by Hollywood and it introduced the lovely song “Stella by Starlight,” later recorded by many jazz musicians and singers.
8. “A Guy Named Joe”/”Always” “A Guy Named Joe” was Spencer Tracy, a WWII bomber pilot known for taking great risks, despite the pleading of the woman he loves (Irene Dunne). When he is killed in action, he comes back to help her find love again. Steven Spielberg did an updated version with Richard Dreyfuss and Holly Hunter called “Always,” featuring the luminous Audrey Hepburn as an angel.
9. “Topper” Cary Grant’s star-making role was as screen history’s most debonair ghost, half of a glamorous young couple who try to teach a milquetoast banker (Oscar-winner Roland Young) how to have some fun. Watch for Billie Burke (best known as Glinda the Good Witch in “The Wizard of Oz”) as the banker’s wife. This film led to two sequels and a 1950’s television series.
10. “The Canterville Ghost” This delightful family treasure based on a book by Oscar Wilde and updated to WWII has Robert Young and Margaret O’Brien as the descendants of a 17th century nobleman (Charles Laughton) cursed to haunt the family castle until his cowardice is redeemed by a member of the family. It has been remade a couple of times and there is even an opera version, but this one is the best and available for viewing online.
Other favorites: the ghosts of “A Christmas Carol,” “The Others,” “Ghostbusters,” “The Haunting” (the original version), “Poltergeist,” and “The Eclipse”
Some fighting with punches, very disturbing supernatural images and jump out at you surprises
Diversity Issues:
None
Date Released to Theaters:
March 26, 2010
“The Eclipse” is a moody Irish thriller about a recently widowed teacher who is a volunteer at a local literary festival. Michael (a deeply moving Ciarán Hinds) is doing his best to stay strong for his children and his father-in-law, but has not begun to let himself think about how devastated he is by the loss of his wife.
He is assigned to be the driver for one of the authors at the festival, Lena (Iben Hjejle of “High Fidelity”), who writes non-fiction books about encounters with ghosts. The most prominent author at the festival, in more than one sense of the term, is the pugnacious and needy Nicholas Holden (Aidan Quinn). He comes to the festival in part to see Lena, with whom he has a history and hopes for a future.
All of this could work as a straight-forward drama but writer-director Conor McPherson adds a mysterious overlay of the supernatural that seeps into the interactions between the characters. It creates a pervasive tug of dread and uncertainty. The contrast between the forces the characters are struggling with, from the largest emotional conflicts to the smallest domestic tasks, and the forces that are just beyond reach but seem to be reaching for us. McPherson has a gift for silences and superb control of mood. The story explores the prism of liminality. It is not just the ghosts who are stuck between worlds.
Three recent movies in different genres have had one thing in common — fathers who interact with the ghosts of their dead daughters. In the historical drama “Creation,” Charles Darwin sees the ghost of his daughter as his struggle to deal with her loss reflects in part his struggle over whether to publish his controversial theory of evolution. In the literary adaptation “The Lovely Bones,” the spirit of a murdered girl is stuck in the “in between” as she tries to help her devastated family and expose the killer. And in the thriller “Edge of Darkness,” Mel Gibson plays a cop whose 24-year-old daughter is murdered. As he seeks to understand what she was involved in, he sees her ghost as both a child and an adult, with an especially sweet scene with her at about age five helping him shave.
I always wonder, when something like this happens, whether it is some sort of harmonic convergence or just a coincidence.
