Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		3.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		2.5

Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie Review

A haunted house worth about a billion dollars, a movie worth about a buck-fifty.

Reviewed by Martin Liebman November 19, 2011

Please note: Because 'House of Wax' was released separately, a review for that disc has already been published. This review will cover only Thir13en Ghosts,' and all scores reflect that film only.

Who are you to play God?

Imagine, for a moment, a slick lawyer who shows up with a key and smile and with news of life-changing significance: a distant relative has died and bequeathed a magnificent country home miles from the nearest neighbor, oh, and there's enough money to live comfortably on forever. Quite the deal, huh? But there's inheriting a nice country estate, and there's inheriting a postmodern masterpiece from hell. It's the latter that's at the core of Thir13en Ghosts' story. A family inherits from a recently-deceased eccentric billionaire something that looks like a macabre set piece straight out of an inter-dimensional Hellraiser movie. Or maybe it just looks like that series' famous puzzle box blown up to the size of a mansion and with a few bathrooms installed because, ya know, when ya gotta go ya gotta go, even when demons/ghosts/special effects are haunting the not-so-hallowed halls. So, yeah. It's not exactly the kind of place one puts down roots with a kitchen table for dinners and homework, a big screen for Sunday ball games, and a pool in the back yard for entertaining guests. Put that sucker on the market, list it for half off, hope some other eccentric billionaire playboy gobbles it up, and run with the leftover cash. Or better yet, just nuke the thing form orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

House of pain.

Ghost hunter extraordinaire Cyrus Kriticos (F. Murray Abraham) has just died in a tragic accident while in pursuit of the "twelfth ghost." He's left behind a vast fortune and a nifty little house that's more than just a rich old man's weekend getaway: it's a prison for the twelve very any ghosts he's nabbed. The house has been bequeathed to Cyrus' very broke nephew, the widower Arthur Kriticos (Tony Shalhoub). It's the family's ticket to a better life, but when Art, his children Kathy (Shannon Elizabeth) and Bobby (Alec Roberts), and the family's caretaker Maggie (Rah Digga) arrive at the house, they're surprised to find it the most unusual abode. It's made almost entirely sliding glass plates inscribed with Latin lettering. What was briefly unabashed joy quickly becomes a living nightmare when the family meets one of Cyrus' old employees, a visionary psychic named Dennis Rafkin (Matthew Lillard), who informs them that the home is not suitable for habitation, a lesson that will be learned and reinforced the hard way. As the night wears on, the family must face great terrors and unravel a mystery with life and death consequences.

Thir13een Ghosts (enough with the cutesy spellings where numbers replace letters; it was cool with Se7en, it's just stupid here -- maybe the "cool" factor has something to do with the quality of the movie, but I digress) is at its heart an Action movie disguised as a Horror flick. The movie's bookends are all about action, anyway, with the middle stretch basically background filler and plot advancer. Director Steve Beck's (Ghost Ship; it's apparently in his contract that he can only direct movies with "Ghost" in the title) picture lacks scares. Sure the "ghosts" look all spooky with their slashed up breasts, the big railroad spikes sticking out of their faces, the cage wrapped around their heads, but the movie relies primarily on shock treatment rather than genuine Horror. The ghosts appear for the big scare and move in modern Horror movie jerky fashion, accompanied by big and not-so-scary noises. It's all rather bland, and the dull exposition, flat characters, and generic action scenes don't help matters, either. It does deliver some gruesome kill scenes (that poor lawyer, he had to split, hardy-har-har) and the ghost makeup looks pretty thorough and realistic. Unfortunately, the atmosphere is never frightening, thanks in large part to the by-the-book way the movie plays out. It's never bold, instead just going through the motions and delivering a few surprises that will alter the shape of the movie but that just sort of go in one ear and out the other.

So the ghosts look fine, and that embodies pretty much the only thing Thir13en Ghosts has going for it: its production values. The movie is certainly stylish, and it's clear there's been quite a bit of effort put into making the thing look rather good. The house is the perfect blend of creepy and intriguing. It's a radical departure from the usual Haunted House motif, to be sure, in that it eschews the old, dark, decrepit sort of cobweb-infested and creaky environment for something that looks like some bad dream version of a museum or an Apple store. It's a giant maze of oddities, Latin-inscribed glass, and gears. Oh yes, there are gears aplenty, so many gears that the Lionsgate animated logo looks like simple child's play compared to this. It's fun to behold all of the detail work put into the movie, but that lasts only so long because once the novelty wears off, it quickly becomes evident that the picture is a real grind it out, go-nowhere sort. The performances are adequate, but collectively unmemorable. Tony Shalhoub isn't exactly the sort of guy one would expect to find as a leading man in a Horror flick, which is what makes his character work as well as it does in the movie. He's sort of an affable everyman who's also capable of carrying the load when the you-know-what hits the fans. He does charming and breezy as well as he does bloodied and tired. His performance isn't extraordinary or anything, but he's a surprisingly good choice for the role. The rest of the cast goes through the motions, which is pretty much all a movie like Thir13en Ghosts needs to pass itself off as a capable but generic Action/Horror movie.

Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Thir13en Ghosts scares up a relatively decent 1080p Blu-ray transfer. Detailing is fair, but unspectacular. The sterile glass house lacks character and the transfer doesn't really bring out much of what little fine details there are to see. Faces yield adequate textures, but also tend to look somewhat pasty and smoothed over. Colors are serviceably bland; most of the movie is built on cold, flat hues that certainly don't exude any vibrancy, even in high definition. The image is quite clear and the Blu-ray delivers a noticeable boost in clarity and stability over the DVD. There's some evident but generally unobtrusive banding. Blacks are fair, looking a little washed out here and a hair overpowering there. Flesh tones appear mostly balanced. The image is fairly flat and generally unappealing. This is a transfer that isn't exactly terrible, but the material doesn't lend itself to an eye-popping, eye candy sort of visual experience.

Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Thir13en Ghosts delivers a fun and loud DTS-HD MA 5.1 lossless soundtrack that's the unequivocal highlight of the disc. This track throws a ton of sound at the listener, but it never feels absurdly forced or unrealistic. It's a bit lacking in finesse, but it more than makes up for that with raw strength and effort. The picture opens with a truck crashing through a gate and rumbling on through the soundstage, its diesel engine powering it along the way. The entire soundstage springs to life with sounds of working men and shifting heavy machinery. Gusty winds blow through the soundstage with raw energy but not much precision. Such heavy, involved elements define much of the track. There's little difference inside the house, but it adds in some drifting, spooky whispers and other Horror movie sounds that haunt every speaker in the set-up. There's a positive overlaying rumble to parts of the movie that give it some body. The surrounds are used extensively, and while it's not always absolutely natural, the track sure does strive to deliver an immersive and entertaining listening experience. With center-focused and clear dialogue, this track is rounded into a good, solid, but not absolutely seamless, listen.

Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Thir13en Ghosts features an audio commentary and a couple of 480p featurettes.

• Audio Commentary: Production Designer Sean Hargreaves, KNB Effects Group's Howard Berger, and Director Steve Beck deliver a balanced and diverse track that covers a broad range of material. Of course the production design -- with emphasis on set decorations -- and makeup effects -- with emphasis on the ghosts -- dominate, but there's plenty of other goodness in here, too. They discuss the movie's basic "roller coaster" "good time" approach, which at least acknowledges that this is not meant to be high art. Good on the filmmakers for knowing where their film fits in the grand scheme of things.
• 13 Ghosts Revealed (480p, 18:40): cast and crew talk up the film's roots, its story, makeup work, set design, and more.
• Ghost Files (480p, 14:10): Cyrus Kriticos introduces viewers to the film's ghosts.

Thir13en Ghosts / House of Wax Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Thir13en Ghosts is a serviceable movie that's just good enough to entertain on a boring Saturday night. Its weakness are many, but its strengths -- notably its production values, sets, and makeup work -- are rather good. The end result is a movie that's certainly not an embarrassment but that's not exactly a top-of-the-heap, award-winning masterpiece, either. There are worse places for a movie to be, that's fore sure. Warner's Blu-ray release of Thir13en Ghosts yields serviceable technical specs and a few extras. Give it a rent.