{"id":34099,"date":"2014-05-08T08:00:17","date_gmt":"2014-05-08T15:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/?p=34099"},"modified":"2014-05-07T23:41:01","modified_gmt":"2014-05-08T06:41:01","slug":"he-says-she-says-the-frighteners-1996","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2014\/05\/he-says-she-says-the-frighteners-1996\/","title":{"rendered":"He Says, She Says: The Frighteners (1996)"},"content":{"rendered":"

[In this series, my husband Jonathan<\/a> and I each write our reactions to films we watch together. Many of these films are ones that one of us is specifically sharing with the other, but it may also just be films that we watch and want to write about.]<\/b><\/p>\n

The Movie<\/h3>\n

\"hsss-frighteners_poster_021\"Director:<\/b> Peter Jackson
\nScreenplay:<\/b> Fran Walsh, Peter Jackson
\nCast:<\/b> Michael J. Fox, Trini Alverado, Peter Dobson, John Astin, Jeffrey Combs, Dee Wallace, Jake Busey, Chi McBride
\nInfo:<\/b> 1996 New Zealand\/USA, Universal
\nChooser:<\/b> Jonathan
\nDate and Method Watched:<\/b> 30 March 2014, Netflix Instant<\/p>\n

She Says…<\/h3>\n

\"Jandy-avatar\"When Jonathan mentioned that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d like to put this on his list for me to watch, I was kind of like, whatever. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know anything about it except that it was Peter Jackson before he became Lord of the Rings<\/em> Peter Jackson, and that it was a horror-type movie with a somewhat goofy edge. At least, I think I knew about the goofy edge – Jon usually doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t pick straight-up horror movies for me to watch, so maybe I just inferred that.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Anyway, there IS a goofy edge, and I loved it. Michael J. Fox is a paranormal investigator or something – basically he offers his services to exorcise poltergeists from people\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s houses, thanks to a near-death experience that allows him to see ghosts who are sticking around earth for whatever reason instead of shuffling off to the great light in the sky. When a bunch of people die of apparent freak heart attacks and Fox\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s spidey sense sees numbers carved in their foreheads, he figures something\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s up and starts investigating.<\/p>\n

\"hsss-Frighteners-number\"<\/p>\n

For some reason I did think it was from the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc80s, so I was expecting super-cheesy SFX, but the effects in here are actually quite good. The ghosts moving through walls bits were quite effective, and the semi-transparent, glowy look of Fox\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s poltergeist pals was amusing as well. Though the tone is largely silly, there are some real thrills, as well, especially when Fox and his lady friend (Trini Alverado, who I only had seen in Little Women<\/em> before) go into an old hospital, aka the creepiest places ever, in search of the means to defeat the big bad.<\/p>\n

I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have very high expectations for this one, but I enjoyed the heck out of it. Chalk up another hit for Jonathan – he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s getting to know my tastes pretty well!<\/p>\n

\"hsss-Frighteners-ghost\"<\/p>\n

My Souvenir<\/b>: The hospital sequence toward the end. Abandoned hospitals are super-creepy to begin with, especially when they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re psychiatric hospitals. And I love this sort of creepy – it sends my spine tingling like nothing else. Then add in the fact that Fox keeps being thrust back and forth between the present (creepy abandoned) hospital and the past working (still kinda creepy) hospital, which hits all of my paranormal\/alt universe\/time travel type buttons (not that those things were actually happening, but they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re in the same ballpark), and I totally loved it. It also upped the suspense a lot, because Fox couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t control when he swapped back and forth, which meant that he couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t always tell when the crazy attacker was right on top of him or not. Very effective and very fun.<\/p>\n

He Says…<\/h3>\n

\"Jon-avatar\"There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Lord of the Rings<\/em> Peter Jackson, and then there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s everything before that. The Frighteners<\/em> was the first of his pre-fantasy films I decided to watch and boy was I in for a treat. The film had the sillies and willies in equal measure, and I was struck by just how well it all came together. Of course, I then watched some of his other films and realized that this shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have been a surprise. In fact, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s surprising what he was able to do with dwarves and hobbits given his penchant for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153morbid screwball.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Perhaps no one watched his earlier work when giving him the reins to the most beloved fantasy franchise of all time?<\/p>\n

But I digress.<\/p>\n

\"hsss-Frighteners-Fox-ghost\"<\/p>\n

The major standout of The Frighteners<\/em> for me is the special effects. From spectres trying to break free of the walls to a mean Grim Reaper (pretty much a prototype for the LOTR Ringwraith), it all looks good. You can tell that WETA Workshop will become a real force in the SFX world. I especially liked the ghosts that inhabited this world. That effect is almost too good to be in a movie from 1996.<\/p>\n

Overall, this is a fun movie that has some great effects and an interesting take on ghosts and the afterlife. The characters are zany and the plot is a bit out there, but therein lies the fun. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d place this after Galaxy Quest<\/em> and Mystery Men<\/em> in the list of flicks to watch to understand where I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m coming from.<\/p>\n

\"hsss-Frighteners-friendly-ghosts\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[In this series, my husband Jonathan and I each write our reactions to films we watch together. Many of these films are ones that one of us is specifically sharing with the other, but it may also just be films that we watch and want to write about.] The Movie Director: Peter Jackson Screenplay: Fran […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34107,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2434],"tags":[2918,2769,2917],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/hsss-Frighteners-feat.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":23514,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/dvd-triage-week-of-june-21\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":0},"title":"DVD Triage: Week of June 21","author":"Jandy","date":"June 21, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Another kind of lackluster week, though there are a few solid releases in here. The Instant Watch selection is particularly slim, but there's a good chunk of films slated for the first of the month, as usual, so look for that next week to offset all the expirations that I've\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/dvd-triage3.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":473,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2007\/06\/afis-100-years100-movies-2007-edition\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":1},"title":"AFI’s 100 Years…100 Movies — 2007 Edition","author":"Jandy","date":"June 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"The American Film Institute released an updated version of their 100 Years...100 Movies list of greatest American movies. Apparently they're going to do that every ten years. I only saw the tail end of the special last night--did any one else catch it? I think I saw the top fifteen\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":33343,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2013\/11\/the-story-of-film-on-tcm-chapter-9\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":2},"title":"The Story of Film on TCM: Chapter 9","author":"Jandy","date":"November 23, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"[Turner Classic Movies is airing Mark Cousins' epic documentary The Story of Film, playing one episode a week accompanied by films discussed in that week's episode. I'm writing up my thoughts on each episode. I got behind four weeks ago, but rather than give up, I'm going to just post\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/The_Story_of_Film-9.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":31576,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2012\/05\/he-says-she-says-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":3},"title":"He Says, She Says: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles","author":"Jandy","date":"May 23, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"My husband Jonathan and I have been taking turns choosing movies we care about a lot to share with each other; both of us getting to catch up on a lot we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve missed. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re posting about a selected ones of these films on our blogs. The Movie Movie: Teenage Mutant\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/TMNT-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":29752,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2011\/12\/he-says-she-says-waynes-world\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":4},"title":"He Says, She Says: Wayne’s World","author":"Jandy","date":"December 5, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"My boyfriend Jonathan and I both love movies (thankfully!), but we've found that even though we have fairly similar tastes a lot of time, we've each seen a lot that the other hasn't, simply due to what we've been exposed to over the years. So we've been taking turns choosing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/waynes-world1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":33465,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2013\/12\/the-story-of-film-on-tcm-chapter-13\/","url_meta":{"origin":34099,"position":5},"title":"The Story of Film on TCM: Chapter 13","author":"Jandy","date":"December 2, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This is the story of the end of an era. For 100 years, movies had been shot on this - celluloid. Paper-thin, shiny, perforated. A medium so sensitive it could capture the subtle colors in snow. But in the '90s, the digital image and Terminator 2 came and reality got\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/SoF-The_Story_of_Film-90s.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34099"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}