from Film Forum, 10/28/02On to the next exhibit in this week's tour of troubling imagery: Ghost Ship is the second successful horror flick of the month, refusing to sink under the weight of bad reviews. Is it celebrating evil? The movie reportedly portrays the ship's passengers drawn to their various demises by their own foolishness and moral weakness, so perhaps the narrative could be considered a morality play. But more often than not, Hollywood horror flicks subvert their own storytelling, serving up intoxicating imagery of sinfulness and suffering rather than edifying with symbolic, cautionary tales.
That seems to be the case again here. Paul Bicking calls the film "a moral derelict." Gerri Pare (Catholic News) calls it "an uninspired horror flick with nothing special to recommend it, and one can only hope Ghost Ship will vanish without a trace."
Mainstream press critics also fired on the ship. Steven Holden (The New York Times) says, "Ghost Ship … is so preoccupied with delivering its effects that it doesn't bother to make sense of its story."
