Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
I've had a chance to see GHOSTS OF MARS now, but because it was at an official press screening, I'm under embargo until the day of release. That means I can't tell you that I enjoyed a good deal of the movie, or that I had some structural problems with it, or that I would say it's a safe bet for fans of the man. Nope. Can't say any of that. What I can do is offer you a review written by Our Man In Manhattan, MrBeaks. He was also able to participate in a Q&A with Carpenter after, so this should be fun. I hope he's able to get press credentials lined up for the upcoming New York Film Festival. Can't think of a better guy to cover it for us. Anyway... here he is. Beaks?
JOHN CARPENTER’S GHOSTS OF MARS (d. who do ya think? w. Carpenter and Larry Sulkis)
In the Q&A that followed Thursday evening’s screening of JOHN CARPENTER’S GHOSTS OF MARS, the legendary director of HALLOWEEN and BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA addressed the difficulty inherent in making an unapologetic genre film by stating rather simply that the trick is in making sure the picture “creaks” as little as possible. While there’s no doubt that GHOSTS OF MARS is a rickety, noisy vessel, it is one that – to use Carpenter’s verbiage – creaks in a satisfyingly familiar manner, and ends up working by virtue of embracing those shopworn elements, rather than, as has become so popular in the post-SCREAM era, throwing them a knowing, but somehow disrespecting, smirk.
The genre in question here, despite the interplanetary setting, is the Western. In fact, GHOSTS OF MARS marks Carpenter’s second go-round with Howard Hawks’s grandly entertaining RIO BRAVO, the landmark, star-studded epic that also, in tandem with the more-recent NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, gave Carpenter’s ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 its sturdy bone-structure. This time out, however, Carpenter is more single-minded in his aim to recapture the gripping, but humorous, tenor of Hawks’s classic, and his zeal to make a genuine Western – reflected in his imaginary use of New Mexico locations as a stand-in for his Mars exteriors – certainly outstrips his interest in the essentially secondary sci-fi trappings.
The story, told in a rather loopy flashback format, begins with the mysterious return on auto pilot of a seemingly abandoned prison transport; however, upon boarding, a sole survivor, Officer Melanie Ballard (Natasha Henstridge), is found, and she is immediately put before a tribunal, where she relates her version of what happened during the supposedly routine pick-up of notorious criminal, James “Desolation” Williams (Ice Cube).
At this point, we are flung backwards in time to the beginning of this ill-fated mission, and introduced to Ballard’s crew, including her tough, unabashedly lesbian superior, Helena (played by the ever-smoldering Pam Grier), the irrepressibly horny Jericho (Jason Statham), and the obligatory rookie, Kincaid (Clea DuVall). Once some largely routine tension within the crew is established, the transport arrives at Chryse, a mining outpost that has been eerily silenced. A little exploration uncovers the reason for the quiet: all the inhabitants have been brutally, almost ritualistically, massacred; that is, everyone save for the prisoners. Though Helena immediately suspects Desolation, it isn’t long before the officers discover that the murders have been committed by a large group of the town’s residents who have been possessed by the planet’s reawakened former inhabitants: the titular, malevolent “Ghosts” who are bent on wiping out the human scourge, and reclaiming Mars for themselves.
While credit must be given to Carpenter for tackling the prickly theme of dominion – the need for the colonizing humans to wipe out Mars’s indigenous population uncomfortably mirrors our own ruthless realization of manifest destiny – GHOSTS OF MARS is, first and foremost, a cutthroat (literally, at times) action-adventure, and Carpenter has wisely altered his style to emphasize mayhem over mood. At ninety-eight minutes, the film is constantly surging forward, even when we’ve been plunged into a flashback within a flashback, and while the editing is never pretty (lots of dissolves and ugly wipes), it fits the ramshackle nature of the picture.
What’s disappointing, however, is that these concessions to modern-day filmmaking have compromised the most enjoyable aspects of Carpenter’s films, most notably in the scoring and framing departments. In teaming up with Anthrax and the guitarist Buckethead to compose the music, Carpenter has arranged a functionally propulsive, but thoroughly unmemorable score. As for his usually impressive widescreen compositions, this is, I’m sad to say, the first Carpenter film that won’t suffer greatly from the normally unforgiving pan-and-scan of home video. And while I usually love Gary Kibbe’s cinematography, the film is often marred by a murkiness that frustratingly obscures the action.
Thank Nipsy, then, for the chemistry between Natasha Henstridge and Ice Cube, two previously unremarkable actors who have responded to the material in very interesting ways. Henstridge has worked the tough/sexy landscape before in the SPECIES films, but here she is tones down her already pronounced sensuality and actually cuts a fairly imposing figure as the no-nonsense Ballard. Ice Cube, on the other hand, still relies on his trademark glower, but, with his occasionally soft delivery, this is the first time he’s actually attempted anything approaching character work, and the results are encouraging. Best of all, Henstridge and Cube seem to be having a blast together, and their playfulness goes a long way towards offsetting the film’s many rough patches.
If I can’t quite bring myself to recommend JOHN CARPENTER’S GHOSTS OF MARS to anyone outside of the director’s fan base, this is not to say that the film won’t play well to mainstream audiences. The overt gore and fast pace will most likely please young males, who are much less likely to turn their nose up at the excessive expository dialogue, even though they will no doubt be disappointed with Henstridge remaining clothed for the entirety of the film. And while the film is an unfussy genre work, it still has that cynical, Carpenter-esque sense of humor, which provides, as always, for a few memorable lines.
Judging from the Q&A, Carpenter is thoroughly comfortable with the niche he has carved out for himself, and will happily continue to make moderately budgeted genre films until he is ready to pack it in for good. While this mindset has translated into two modestly entertaining films over the last few years, I’m hoping that we’re not witnessing a trend towards more workmanlike pictures from one of the few living masters of the American Cinema. Though he has certainly earned this luxury, and owes his admirers nothing, who wouldn’t like to see one last swing for the fences?
Faithfully Submitted,
P.S. One tidbit from the Q&A: Carpenter and Roddy Piper will be recording a commentary for a THEY LIVE DVD sometime in the near-future. Also, while he was peppered with questions regarding a re-teaming with Kurt Russell, he seemed to think that Kurt’s price tag renders this rather unlikely.
