Shawn's Ghost Town Review

2008 Movie #145 - Ghost Town

It’s a shame this movie didn’t do better because I would say this is for sure one of the most underrated movies of the year. Hopefully it finds a better life when it comes out on DVD this week because it really does deserve some recognition.

For the most part this is a pretty standard romantic comedy. It follows all the basic rules, even throwing in the usual cliché of the guy being an asshole until he meets the main girl and she changes him around and makes him believe in love and all that. There’s a fight in the third act and basically everything you would ever expect to happen in a romantic comedy. The key thing here is that this movie does it well. Sure you never doubt what will happen, but the plot manages to throw in a few little surprises and keep things interesting. It tries, which is more than I can say about most of the other romantic comedies I’ve had to endure this year.

Ricky Gervais is for sure an odd choice to play the lead role in a romantic comedy, but hell that’s why they deserve some credit. It was not the safe choice and the movie benefits greatly from it. Gervais is great and I hope this movie’s poor box office performance doesn’t stop people from giving him the lead in movies more often. He really elevates this movie higher than it should probably deserve to go. Greg Kinnear and Tea Leoni are good as well, but it’s for sure Gervais who steals the entire show.

The movie is also funny. It doesn’t rely on wacky situations (although the whole ghost thing in itself is pretty out there I guess) or over the top characters to get some cheap laughs. Instead it relies on smart dialogue to bring the funny. You don’t see that much so again, kudos to Ghost Town on that one as well. There’s no musical number or some silly fucking montage of trying on different clothes or whatever, just a straight forward good old fashioned romantic comedy.

I really can’t stress enough how much you should check this one out. It’s good for just about all ages and dares to do something different with a tired movie genre. Don’t let Hollywood think we’re scared of actual good movies. Give this one some money and buy the DVD.

*** ½ / 5