GHOST TOWN

“GHOST TOWN” (Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear & Tea Leoni)

The film that immediately came to mind while viewing “Ghost Town” was “Hancock”.
Like the Will Smith indifferent superhero flick, ‘Ghost Town’ switches from pure comedy to a semi-serious melodrama; the difference – it works here. I really enjoyed this film. It had plenty of laughs & even though they’re sparse in the final acts, I found it to be rather sweet & poignant. “Hancock” goes awry by becoming seriously ‘stupid’, this comedy develops a ‘heart’ & that heart comes from the Ricky Gervais character of Dr. Bertram Pincus – derisively called ‘Pink-ass’ by Greg Kinnear’s ‘ghost’ throughout most of the film.
Gervais is the creator of the original version of ‘The Office’ a TV series I have tried on several occasions to like, but can’t. I like Steve Carell, but I simply don’t find his version of ‘The Office’ very funny.
In ‘Ghost Town’ Gervais’ dentist character is a bitter, unlikeable a-hole. He enjoys his occupation not because he relieves his patients’ pain, but because he can stick cotton in their mouths & shut them up.
The plot percolates when Dr. Pincus dies for 7 minutes during a colonoscopy. After the incident he discovers he can see & hear the ghosts of New York. As they discover he has this ability they begin ‘haunting’ him day & night, asking for him to help them bring relief to their loved ones, or those who’s lives have been ‘damaged’ by their deaths; 3 construction workers want him to tell their foreman it wasn’t his fault they were killed, it was faulty equipment, not operator error. The most annoying ghost is that of Frank (Kinnear) who wants ‘Pink-ass’ to somehow break up the relationship his widowed wife is developing with a ‘smarmy’ attorney. Kinnear’s character is as shallow as Gervais, except the dentist has an excuse for loathing the human race, Frank is just a jerk-wad who was cheating on his wife, Gwen (Tea Leoni) at the time of his death.
So the situation is old – made of the ideas that sprung many a TV sitcom back in the ‘I Dream Of Jeannie’/’Bewitched’ era as Gervais’ Pincus has conversations with ‘dead people’ that only he can see or hear. Yet somehow – perhaps because he is such an unlikeable creep – the dialogue actually comes off as rather refreshing at times. Or maybe it’s due to the fact that this character fits Gervais’ comedic style to a tee. Even when the laughs dry up & they go for the ‘lump in the throat’ bittersweet finale, “Ghost Town” blends both styles perfectly & I found myself putting it in my Top 10 films of the year (So far)
Even Leoni, whom I normally find to be somewhat of a 'stiff' actress, delivers a likeable performance - her reactions to Gervais' Pincus both when he's being a creep & when he
becomes smitten with her are very credible.
If I had one complaint, it’s an odd one – As one scene opens there’s a close up of a pair of hands banging away on a set of bongo drums, for a fleeting moment I thought as the camera panned back to reveal the drummer that it might be Richard Jenkins’ character from the film that is still atop my list for Best Film of 2008, “The Visitor”. But alas, I was wrong. Not a very big detail to be disappointed on though, is it?
Good film – Unless you’re one of those that expect your comedies to remain comedies all the way thru, I would recommend it highly for a pleasurable movie-going experience...