Ghost Town

Ghost Town (2008)

Ranking: I guess

About an unpleasant dentist (Ricky Gervais, playing essentially the same character he played on The Office, only less so) who has a near death experience and starts seeing ghosts. Holy shit. He eventually meets up with this dead guy (Greg Kinnear) who needs help preventing his widow (Téa Leoni) from marrying a human rights lawyer (Billy Campbell). Of course, Ricky Gervais falls in love with her and along the way learns how to care about other people rather than just himself. It's sort of like what would happen if The Eye was a romantic comedy.

The movie borders on tacky throughout, from the guy who can see ghosts and must therefore solve their problems and help them move on into the afterlife bit, to the trying to trick us into thinking that the couple won't get together when we all know they will (I would have been happy if Ricky Gervais had died at the end, but that's just me). I didn't really believe that Téa Leoni would end up with Ricky Gervais. He must have some redeeming features. Actually, he did have a certain charm...

Anyway, despite the borderline tackiness, this movie was okay. It had a fairly dark sense of humour (though not as dark as it could have been), decent dialogue and some good stuff. Ex: people sneeze whenever they walk through a ghost. I like that idea.

I laughed. It did make me want to watch Dead Like Me again (which I did, actually...), although pretty much anything makes me want to watch Dead Like Me. Waffles, post-its, toilet seats, extra exra extra crispy bacon, people named George... I fucking love that show.

Yeah, so this movie was okay, and way more amusing to me than a lot of romantic comedies (I don't really do rom-coms ordinarily. I have been so disappointed by many of them. I still haven't gotten over You Me and Dupree. That movie was such a let down). Actually, pretty much the only time I enjoy a romantic comedy is when it has ghosts or zombies in it... says a lot about my upbringing...

END

Directed by: David Koepp. Written by: David Koepp and John Kamps. Starring: Ricky Gervais, Téa Leoni, Greg Kinnear, Billy Campbell, Aasif Mandvi, Kristen Wiig, Alan Ruck.