The Ghostmaker
A group of college friends discover a 15th century coffin that allows them to experience the world as ghosts. While their first adventures in the spirit world are playful and innocent, the "Box of Shadows" soon brings out the group's most dangerous impulses and desires. The friends find themselves pulled into a world of evil where they learn the line between life and death is there for a reason.
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- Cast:
- Aaron Dean Eisenberg , Liz Fenning , J. Walter Holland , Jared Grey , Domiziano Arcangeli , Jeffrey Damnit , Hans Uder
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Reviews
Really Surprised!
Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike
Please don't spend money on this.
A lot of fun.
This is one of those movies that make you search out for horror. You ignore the ratings of those artsy fartsy reviews who think they know it all. The Ghostmaker was wonderful and engaging.It was a mix of sci-fi and mix of horror. It was small budget but the 3 male leads were excellent. The movie is about a machine that allows you to die. Somewhat like FLatliners but nothing wrong with a movie that is similar. It has it's own spin and scenarios and twists.Excellent, highly recommended for horror fans. If you are a fan of horror I will give this a 8-9 out of 10. Don't knock it because it is low budget. It's a highly watchable movie.
I'll first say that THE GHOSTMAKER isn't an original film at all. The premise seems to be a toss up between FLATLINERS and THE ASPHYX, with the narrative incorporating elements of FINAL DESTINATION and GHOST along the way. The special effects have clearly been inspired by those in THE FRIGHTENERS. Other than that, this is a surprisingly good little movie.I wasn't expecting much from this, I admit, having had my fingers burnt too many times by the glut of boring, repetitive and clichéd teen horror films out there. Most of them involve a group of kids being bumped off by a maniac, but THE GHOSTMAKER actually has some intelligence behind it in the story of a trio of guys who find a clockwork coffin that has the power to temporarily transform them into ghosts.The plotting isn't great, as things end up on a smaller scale basis than you'd expect, and there are some clichés here. But at the same time the character development is pretty intriguing, and the acting is acceptable for the genre. The special effects are actually pretty good given what must have been a tiny budget to work with. Not a film to blow you away but one well worth checking out for the horror fans among us.
I've been waiting for years to get my hands on a copy of this movie. And I was pleased to finally see it. I was worried when it spent so many years being delayed which raised some concerns. But it's a decent horror flick. The acting, film and effects are good and are on par with any well made modern flick. On a 1-10, I'd give it a 7 (I think more could have been done with the story or plot) but and 8 for subject matter and originality. The movie reminds me of the Guillermo del Toro movie Cronos. The ancient mechanical horror theme is very similar. The protangonists too are very flawed and the box brings their own demons to the surface. It doesn't scare me or really creep me out but it was entertaining and wasn't predictable.I've seen tons of bad horror movies. I'll probably watch this movie aqain down the road at some point. I can't say that for many. I even purchased a copy of it.
There used to be a cocktail once that contained gin, absinthe and, possibly, brandy - I can't remember. I do know, however, that it was more-or-less banned back in the 1920s for causing effects similar to brain death.This film is the visual version of that great drink.The plot is implausible at best, the characters are the sort that make you truly wish that they would suffer and die, preferably quickly, and the special fx, if there actually were any used, were less interesting even than the characters.Firstly, the film wasn't horror. It certainly wasn't even scary. It most definitely wasn't even logical.Three ubiquitous horror film staples - college kids - find themselves involved with an ancient coffin containing some actually quite wondrous clockwork devices that enable the person lying in the coffin to experience existence as a ghost.An interesting premise, but it goes downhill from there on. The director apparently equated "ancient" with the fifteenth century and then filled a typical 19th century coffin with all manner of cogwheels and little rocking thingies and dinky widgets, gadgets and twinkly Faraday electric arc effects to create a machine that is marvellous to the eye which, and this is important, is ALSO a fabulous music box in the Grotesquerie style: imagine Stravinsky's weirder works blown through a sound attenuation device and echo chamber.Add to this a "Mechanical Death" stalking (in a gentle, non-frightening, non-disruptive manner) the guys using the machine and you end up with a film that - with just a little rewriting, re-editing and a new set of actors who actually CAN act - would make a fairly good Gothic comedy horror.Naturally one of the students falls victim to Death's barely discernible wrath; one goes totally demented and becomes a stalker/rapist/generic psycho - but not too violent, of course - while the third somehow manages to rehabilitate himself from thief/junkie to all-round Good Egg in order to save the day. If, after reading this review, you feel a sudden urge to rush out and get this film on DVD or download it from the Internet, please consider psychiatric help.I've given three stars to the film for one simple reason: the wonderful Antikytheran clockwork machinery. Well, maybe half a star went to Aaron Dean Eisenberg for being rather cute...I'll shut up now.