Thirteen Ghosts (2001)

Directed by Steve Beck. Starring Tony Shalhoub, Matthew Lillard, Shannon Elizabeth, Embeth Davidtz, Rah Digga, J.R. Bourne, F. Murray Abraham, Alec Roberts. [R]

Noisy, disorienting garbage inspires a rare kind of envy aimed toward the victims of the gruesome attacks—at least the pain ends when they’re dead. Except, according to this movie’s slovenly and halfhearted mythology, the world is filled to the gills with ghosts (mostly harmless), so it’s likely that everyone who gets axed in this movie has to then keep watching their friends and foes battle it out with mutilated phantoms. Dumb story finds Shalhoub and family inheriting a bizarre, machine-like house (post-corporeal post-modernism?) that’s inhabited by a dozen vengeful spirits; as for the spectre that would turn their gang into the baker’s dozen of the title, the screenplay’s explanation is muddled (or else the dialogue was too muffled by the soundtrack). At least half of the running time is composed of ear-splitting sound effect crashes and jarring editing, which causes all the violent supernatural confrontations to inspire migraines, not scares. As for its tortured style and senselessly showy sets—proof that unusual and chaotically arty production design doesn’t necessarily equate to good production design—it provides the least atmospheric architecture possible for a supernatural shocker. The ghosts themselves, meanwhile, are one and all grotesque and utterly immemorable, often seen in brief, gory flashes (only when characters wear special glasses can they be seen in the first place). Just plain inept and agonizing from start to finish. Bears virtually no resemblance to the 1960 William Castle film from which this movie takes its name; said title is sometimes stylized here as THIR13EN GHOSTS, because they want to hurt you before you even sit down to watch.

5/100