Ghosts of Mars

John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars
US Theatrical release poster
Directed by	John Carpenter
Written by	John Carpenter Larry Sulkis
Produced by	Sandy King
Starring	Ice Cube Natasha Henstridge Jason Statham Pam Grier Clea DuVall Joanna Cassidy
Cinematography	Gary B. Kibbe
Edited by	Paul C. Warschilka
Music by	John Carpenter Steve Vai Buckethead Robin Finck Anthrax
Production company	Storm King Productions
Distributed by	Screen Gems
Release date	August 24, 2001 (2001-08-24)
Running time	98 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$28 million
Box office	$14,010,832

Ghosts of Mars, also known as John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars and sometimes shortened to GOM, is a 2001 American action-horror science fiction film written and directed by John Carpenter. The film stars Ice Cube, Natasha Henstridge, Jason Statham, Pam Grier, Clea DuVall, and Joanna Cassidy. The film is noted for its soundtrack, which the director composed along with some big names in heavy metal music.

Ghosts of Mars received a mixed critical reception, and was a box office bomb, earning $14 million at the box office against a $28 million production budget. John Carpenter revealed that he had "become a "burnout" during the filmmaking, and made the decision of "leaving Hollywood for good". It would not till nine years later, in 2010, that he made a full feature film, The Ward.

Ghosts of Mars fared better on home video, and has been described by numerous sources as a cult film. This is similar to many of Carpenter's earlier films which also tended to fare poorly at the box office, but later attained significant popularity on home video.

Production

John Carpenter said that he wanted a much more physical film, expanding on the famous gritty fight scene between Roddy Piper and Keith David fight in They Live with "rugged space cops, independent crooks and self-confident warriors". Carpenter hired Jeff Imada, who had done the stunts on Big Trouble in Little China, to train the cast of Ghosts of Mars and do the choreography of the fight scenes. The special effects supervisor is credited as "Monkey Overlord."

Filming

Filming took place from 8 August 2000 to 31 October 2000 and entirely at night with Metallica playing. To achieve the look the director envisioned for Mars, and to provide Carpenter's trademark wide Panavision scope with the most photographic options, a 55-acre area was sprayed with thousands of gallons of biodegradable vegetable dye, turning cliffs, roads and even mountains a dusky red tone. In regards to GOM's fictional Shining Canyon, the set was built in and around real life gypsum mines in Zia Pueblo, New Mexico, an Native American-owned area that includes the ancient and holy pueblos that provide the area's name. Photography is forbidden at the Pueblos themselves, but Carpenter says that the Indians were accommodating of their production: "[The locals were] very cooperative about letting us use the area, about letting us do just about anything," says Carpenter. "We staged fights, gun battles, blew stuff up, and even painted everything red. This is Mars, so everything has to be red you know." Other New Mexico filming locations included White Sands, San Ysidro, Rio Rancho, and in studios in Los Angeles, California.

Natasha Henstridge, a last minute replacement to the lead female role, found the experience of filming Ghosts of Mars to be very harrowing, due to the heavily physical nature of her role and the difficult working conditions. Having just done three other films back-to-back, Henstridge fell ill due to extreme exhaustion and production of Ghosts of Mars had to shut down for a week.

Taglines

• You Don't Stand A Ghost Of A Chance
• It's their planet... we are the aliens.
• Terror is the same on any planet
• Forget The Rules. Abandon Your Fears. Save Your Soul.

Plot

By the second half of the 22nd century the human race has successfully completed 84% terraforming of the atmosphere on the planet Mars. This is just enough for humans to breathe on the Martian surface without space suits, although protective goggles are worn against the elements. There are 640,000 Martian colonists living in in spread-out settlements across the planet, many of which are frontier towns not unlike the Old American West. The first and oldest human settlement on Mars, Chryse City, has since expanded to a burgeoning metropolis, ruled over by a "matriarchal cartel", and in which the MPF (Mars Police Force) enforce Earth law.

In 2176 A.D, reports emerge of sudden mass insanity, rioting, and gruesome murder across the remote outposts of the Southern Valley, and rumors abound and unease grow out of control across the planet. The mining boomtown of Shining Canyon reports that it has captured the notorious criminal, bank robber and frequent prison escapee James "Desolation" Williams (Ice Cube), who is erroneously blamed for the murders. When Chryse City loses all communication with Shining Canyon, a five-member police squad is ordered to go there by freight train, investigate and assess the situation, retrieve Desolation Williams, and escort him back to Chryse for interrogation. The squad consists of MPF Commander Helena Braddock (Pam Grier), second-in-command Lieutenant Melanie Ballard (Natasha Henstridge), and Sergeant Nathan Jericho (Jason Statham), and two rookies. Whilst the rest of the squad are native to Mars, Ballard is a native of Earth. Ballard is weary of the cold, dry, red world, and takes an outlawed hallucinogenic drug to help her better remember the rolling blue oceans of home.

Arriving at Shining Canyon, the police squad find almost all of the people either missing or murdered in a savage fashion. The only apparent survivors, including Desolation Williams and civilians, are still locked away in the jail, and they had done so deliberately to avoid the massacre. In the jail, the situation is explained to Lt. Ballard by Dr. Arlene Whitlock (Joanna Cassidy) who earlier, at an archeological dig site at Drucker's Ridge, had uncovered an ancient underground doorway created by a long-dead, native Martian civilization. When the tomb was opened it released disembodied spirits or "ghosts" of the long-dead Martians, appearing as glowing red mists, which seemingly took spiritual or demonic possession of the people. Dr. Whitlock hypothesizes that they are a form of life which was formally dormant, and has been awoken by the terraforming to "take vengeance on any who would lay claim to their planet". Dr. Whitlock was able to escape Drucker's Ridge by riding away on a modified weather balloon, but the Martian ghosts followed her to Shining Canyon, and took over some of the miners there. Led by "Big Daddy Mars" (Richard Cetrone) the possessed miners create deadly makeshift weaponry, undertake heavy tribal tattooing and crude body piercings, and the Martian ghosts force the possessed to self-mutilate themselves. The possessed also commit acts of extreme human sacrifice on any who are not or cannot be possessed.

The situation is exasperated when Desolation's gang, and his brother, turn up to free him. Ballard herself is possessed by a Martian ghost, and shares the ghost's memories of a primal and war-like ancient Mars, which reveal the ghost inhabiting "Big Daddy Mars" as the former Martian chieftain. Ballard's parasite, however, also shares Ballard's vivid, drug-induced visions of blue ocean waves, and unable to handle them the Martian ghost leaves her body. When Commander Braddock is murdered by the possessed, her head put on a spike, Ballard must assume command, unite the cops and crooks, fight off the savages and escape the outpost. Unfortunately, killing a possessed human merely releases the Martian spirit to possess another human. The train returns, but the unpossessed decide to go back, make a last stand and sabotage Shining Canyon's reactor to create a nuclear meltdown, vaporizing the possessed out of their misery. The team complete this task, but in the last battle the team are all either possessed themselves or go down fighting, leaving only Ballard and Desolation left. On the train, Desolation fights with Big Daddy Mars before blowing him up with dynamite. Not wanting to be blamed for the massacre, Desolation handcuffs Ballard to her cot and escapes from the train after setting it off to Chryse City on auto-pilot. Shining Canyon is obliterated as the train leaves.

The film is revealed as flashback after these events, during which Lt. Ballard is reporting to her superiors in Chryse City. At the end of Ballard's "discovery hearing", the Chryse matriarchs refuse to believe it. Instead they believe Ballard to be traumatized and delusional, and detecting the illegal drugs in her system send her to the hospital to recuperate. Ballard is awoken by the sounds of chaos and terror--the released spirits, unharmed from the nuclear explosion, have arrived in the city. Desolation Williams, alive, enters her room, gives her a gun and offers to team up with her once again. As they leave the hospital, Desolation jokes that Ballard would make a good criminal, and she retorts that he would make a good cop.

Cast

• Ice Cube as James 'Desolation' Williams:

Jason Statham was originally hired to play James "Desolation" Williams, but was replaced by Ice Cube for "star power" and Statham was given the role of Jericho instead.

• Natasha Henstridge as Lieutenant Melanie Ballard:

A number of other actresses were also briefly considered for the role, including Michelle Yeoh, Franka Potente and Famke Janssen; John Carpenter's original choice for Ballard was Courtney Love, but Love's foot was injured early on in filming. Henstridge was suggested by her then-boyfriend Liam Waite who had a role in Ghosts of Mars, and was able to join the cast just a week before production began.

• Jason Statham as Jericho Butler, a veteran Sergeant with the MPF recently assigned to Braddock's squad.
• Clea DuVall as Bashira Kincaid, a rookie recently assigned to Braddock's squad.
• Pam Grier as Mars Police Force Commander Helena Braddock.
• Liam Waite as Michael Descanso, a rookie recently assigned to Braddock's squad.
• Joanna Cassidy as Dr. Arlene Whitlock
• Rosemary Forsyth as The Inquisitor
• Duane Davis as Uno Williams, Desolation's brother.
• Lobo Sebastian as Dos
• Rodney A. Grant as Tres
• Peter Jason as McSimms
• Wanda De Jesus as Akooshay
• Robert Carradine as Rodal
• Richard Cetrone as Big Daddy Mars

Box office

Ghosts of Mars premiered on 24th August 2001. The film opened at #9 in the North American box office in its opening weekend, behind American Pie 2, Rush Hour 2, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, The Others, Rat Race, Summer Catch, The Princess Diaries, and Captain Corelli's Mandolin. Ghosts of Mars grossed $8,709,640 at the North American domestic box office and $5,301,192 internationally, totaling $14,010,832 worldwide against an estimated $28 million production budget, qualifying it as a box office bomb.

Critical reception

Aggregate

Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 21% based on 103 reviews, and a slightly higher user rating at 28%, with the consensus stating "John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars is not one of Carpenter's better movies, filled as it is with bad dialogue, bad acting, confusing flashbacks, and scenes that are more campy than scary." On the Internet Movie Database, the film has a weighted average vote of 4.8 out of 10 by user ratings. BBC Online gives Ghosts of Mars a critics rating of 2 out of 5, with a user rating of 4 out of 5. Metacritic gives Ghosts of Mars a critic's rating of 35%, with a higher user's score of 51%.

Negative

Rob Gonsalves of eFilmCritic.com said: "Ghosts of Mars is not Carpenter at his best. It may very well be Carpenter at rock bottom." Michael Atkinson of Village Voice said that the film must have been "written, directed, and edited with the offhand shoddiness of a day worker thinking about his evening beer." Harry Guerin of RTE Interactive (Dublin, Ireland) said: "More "Mars lacks" than Mars Attacks, and an outing for Carpenter die-hards only."

Critics were generally negative towards the film, including Ice Cube himself, when in a later interview, he nominated this as the worst movie he had appeared in, calling it "unwatchable in many ways. John Carpenter really let us down with the special effects on that one - it looked like something out of a film from 1979".

Positive

Ghosts of Mars did however have some positive reviews. Felix Vasquez of CinemaCrazed praised the gruff characters, the metal soundtrack and the "Alice Coopers on LSD", adding, "This is a good movie for a group of people to watch at a party, or just for guys having a good time. Good job, Mr. Carpenter. All in all, this is a cheesy, D grade, popcorn, guilty pleasure." Nick Schager of Lessons of Darkness said: "Ghosts of Mars may be cheesy, but no more so than Carpenter's earlier cult films Assault on Precinct 13, Big Trouble in Little China, even Escape from New York. There are echoes of all these in Ghosts of Mars, and even The Thing and Halloween. Ghosts of Mars is a rather sturdy, modernized mash-up.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times enjoyed the film, giving it three out of four golden stars and saying:

"John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars is a brawny space opera, transplanting the conventions of Western, cop and martial arts films to the Red Planet. As waves of zombified killers attack the heroes, actions scenes become shooting galleries, and darned if in the year 2176 they aren't still hurling sticks of dynamite from moving trains. All basic stuff, and yet Carpenter brings pacing and style to it. The payoff is a series of well-staged action sequences, made atmospheric by the rusty red atmosphere which colors everything. At one point the cops barricade themselves inside the mining camp's police station, which will remind Carpenter fans of his first feature, Assault on Precinct 13. There is also something about the ghoulish way the possessed miners lurch into action that has a touch of the Living Dead movies. These ghouls or zombies or ghost-creatures are not, however, slow. They're pretty fast in the martial arts scenes, especially their leader, Big Daddy Mars (Richard Cetrone). Ghosts of Mars delivers on its chosen level and I enjoyed it, but I wonder why so many science-fiction films turn into extended exercises in "Blast the Aliens." Starship Troopers was another. Why must aliens automatically be violent, angry, aggressive, ugly, mindless and hostile? How could they develop the technology to preserve their spirits for aeons, and exhibit no civilized attributes? And, for that matter, if Earth-creatures came along after, oh, say, 300 million years of captivity and set you free, would you be mad at them? But these are all questions for another movie."

Awards

Ghosts of Mars was nominated for "Best Film" at the 2001 Sitges-Catalonian International Film Festival.

Soundtrack

Untitled

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
Filmtracks
SoundtrackNet

For the film's soundtrack, John Carpenter recorded a number of synthesizer pieces and assembled an all-star cast of guitarists (including thrash metal band Anthrax, virtuoso Steve Vai, master guitarist Buckethead, and former Guns N' Roses/current Nine Inch Nails guitarist Robin Finck) to record an energetic and technically proficient heavy metal score. Anthrax said on their website:

"The sessions with John Carpenter were great. We did eight pieces of music. It's really good. The movie looks great. There's never been anything this heavy in a movie before. Perfect for the scenes. Music to decapitate by."

Reaction to the soundtrack was mixed; many critics praised the high standard of musicianship and the strong pairing of heavy metal riffs with the film's action sequences, but complained about the overlong guitar solos, the drastic differences between the cues used in the film and the full tracks and the absence of any of the film's ambient synth score from the soundtrack CD. On Amazon.com, the soundtrack album has average customer review of 3.5 out of 5.

Track listing

1. "Ghosts of Mars" (3:42) - Steve Vai, Bucket Baker & John Carpenter
2. "Love Seige [sic]" (4:37) - Buckethead, Robin Finck, John Carpenter & Anthrax (Scott Ian, Paul Crook, Frank Bello & Charlie Benante)
3. "Fight Train" (3:16) - Robin Finck, John Carpenter & Anthrax
4. "Visions of Earth" (4:08) - Elliot Easton & John Carpenter
5. "Slashing Void" (2:46) - Elliot Easton & John Carpenter
6. "Kick Ass" (6:06) - Buckethead, John Carpenter & Anthrax
7. "Power Station" (4:37) - Robin Finck, John Carpenter & Anthrax
8. "Can't Let You Go" (2:18) - Stone (J.J. Garcia, Brian James & Brad Wilson), John Carpenter, Bruce Robb & Joe Robb
9. "Dismemberment Blues" (2:53) - Elliot Easton, John Carpenter & Stone
10. "Fightin' Mad" (2:41) - Buckethead & John Carpenter
11. "Pam Grier's Head" (2:35) - Elliot Easton, John Carpenter & Anthrax
12. "Ghost Poppin'" (3:20) - Steve Vai, Robin Finck, John Carpenter & Anthrax

Sequel

After Ghosts of Mars was released there were numerous internet rumors of a potential sequel named Ghosts of Mars 2: The Return in pre-production, however Carpenter abandoned the project early on as he rarely makes sequels to his films. A Facebook page has been started for fans to call for the sequel to be made, and accepts some ideas submitted by fans to be given over to Carpenter.

External links

• Ghosts of Mars at IMDb
• ‹The template AllMovie title is being considered for deletion.› Ghosts of Mars at AllMovie
• Ghosts of Mars at Box Office Mojo
• Ghosts of Mars at Rotten Tomatoes
• Ghosts of Mars at Metacritic
• John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars at John Carpenter's official site