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Ghost Story


GHOST STORY
(1981, Irvin)
Horror film from the 1980s



"I will take you places you've never been. I will show you things that you have never seen and I will see the life run out of you."

Ghost Story follows four elderly businessmen (Fred Astaire, Melvyn Douglas, Douglas Fairbanks Jr, John Houseman), founders of the Chowder Society in the small town of Milburn in New England. Every week, the four gentlemen get together to share tales of horror and ghost stories. But what happens when the lines between story and real life get blurred, and ghosts from the past bring the above statement?

The horror begins when the son of one of the four men dies in a horrible accident and under suspicious circumstances. As a result, his brother Don (Craig Wasson) returns to Milburn to investigate, which brings to the surface some strange revelations about his brother's fiancée (Alice Krige) and her involvement not only with Don, but with the four gentlemen.

It's interesting how I had never heard of this film before, especially considering the cast. That's the first thing that made me perk up when @Wooley brought it up on his Halloween thread. His thoughts about it made it seem like something I might enjoy, plus he posted some nifty gore, so I thought "Why not?"

Generally speaking, I agree with most of Wooley's assessment. The film is a bit too long, the pace is a bit off, and the film drags a bit after the halfway mark. However, it does succeed in creating an eerie ambience and a general intrigue about what is happening. The few actual jump scares it has do feel like jump scares, if you get what I mean, but the special effects and makeup are effective, and they do the job.

I also appreciated the reasonings behind the haunting of these men, as it's not what you'd usually see in these kind of films. Unfortunately, there is a subplot about two escaped mental patients that becomes incredibly important in the last act, but it's so underwritten that it feels like a left field cheat. Still, the film succeeds in bringing the mood and the scares, even if it's in spurts.

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