“Congratulations. You found a boat. In the middle of the ocean, of all places.”

Justin’s rating: Next season on Disney Cruises!

Justin’s review: Ghost Ship has always boasted a very specific reputation among the early 2000s horror scene, which was that this movie had a killer (pun intended) opening that it followed with a forgettable stretch of bland haunted house tropes. I haven’t seen this in a couple decades, so I was curious to see if this reputation is true or overstated.

Ghost Ship! The ghost ship with the mostest! The ship where Patrick Swayze is the entertainment director and will make sensual pottery with you! The ship that likes to lurk in dark alleyways before jumping out to scare kids! The relationship that disappeared on you without an explanation during a Bahama cruise! Ghost Ship!

Ghost Ship — The Ship That Walks — was only the third production from Dark Castle Entertainment, which started in the late ’90s with an eye on making above-average studio horror flicks. Dark Castle actually has a pretty good track record in those early years, with titles like House on Haunted Hill, Thirteen Ghosts, Gothika, and House of Wax coming out by 2005.

After a conspiracy to kill all of the passengers on a ’60s ocean liner rather unbelievably succeeds, the Antonia Graza becomes a haunted vessel sailing the seas with nobody checking up on it for four whole decades. OK, don’t think about that too much, because we’ve got to get attached to our likable group of maritime salvagers who include Gabriel Byrne, Julianna Margulies, and Karl Urban. They get hired to pull in the ship and score a huge haul.

But little do they know that the Antonia Graza is full of grumpy ghosties and a dark past that’s waiting to be uncovered. What ensues is a 90-minute tour through the corridors of a floating spook shack as they investigate this mystery and gradually get knocked off. They’ve also got a ticking clock, as there’s only three days to patch up the ship before it sinks from a ruptured hull.

Listen, it’s not a deep plot nor an original one, but it’s still a cool idea for a twist on your standard haunted house romp. A giant abandoned cruise ship silently drifting through dark and stormy waters is a total vibe, a big “STAY AWAY” sign to everyone but the most foolhardy.

Yes, the opening is incredibly memorable (as well as laughable), but the rest isn’t something to scoff. Ghost Ship adheres to the formula for supernatural terror without deviating too much, giving us a little bit of a mystery and a spectral conclusion and your standard ghost girl who likes to explain things. It’s going right through The Shining’s playbook, page by page, down to the use of alcohol and sex as temptations by the boat.

Stick around for a pretty impressive sequence later on where ghost girl shows a music-laden montage of how the entire ship’s compliment was killed. That part is more like an MTV video than anything, but it is arresting.

My mind kept making comparisons between this and Event Horizon (as well as Virus and Deep Rising), especially in regard to the foreboding interiors of the ships. The Antonia Graza is 40 years abandoned, after all, with decay and rust setting in everywhere. The lack of people and the abundant signs of disaster make it even more unwelcoming — and that’s before we get to the lethal pranks of the various spirits.

I’m here to say that Ghost Ship is better than its tepid reputation suggests. In fact, I’ve seen many people say that they turned around on this flick after a re-appraisal, and I am part of this crowd. It’s spooky without being mean, horror without being too graphic, and peppered with likable characters, a few good laughs, and even some action sequences. There’s a certain lost quality that was present in these turn-of-the-century horror flicks that has to be experienced to be appreciated, and you might find a trip back to the past — in more ways than one — by watching this.

Intermission!

• Allegedly, the cast was signed on to this project under the impression that this was going to be a horror-lite psychological thriller but found out when they arrived that it got changed into a haunted house flick and were pretty upset.
• I love the sweet, old timey intro font and music
• Everyone stays upright for an incredibly long time after being bisected. I think physics would have something to say about that.
• Underwater repair is more thrilling than you’d think
• That’s one cozy tug boat
• It was a dark and stormy night…
• The clanging clock is a little freaky
• WELCOME in the blocks
• Why’s there a digital watch on the bridge?
• Three days to fix a sinking ship
• Did the boat just drink her head wound blood? And then spit it back out?
• That was the dead body room, you just let them all out
• Gold rats! What did they survive on all these years?
• Yeah, don’t go into the freezer… OK that was fun
• Rock-paper-scissors to see who gets to eat 40-year-old canned food
• Mouth o’ maggots
• Closet skeleton! She’s been hanging around for a long time
• The room putting itself back together is a cool bit of special effects
• “Can’t cheat on your fiancé with a dead girl, right?”
• The “how they all died” montage
• The face-through-the-bullet-hole is a classic shot
• Good for him for shooting. He should’ve shot again.
• It’s a ghost swim party!