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Ghosts of Mars

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John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars
US Theatrical release poster
Directed byJohn Carpenter
Written byJohn Carpenter
Larry Sulkis
Produced bySandy King
StarringIce Cube
Natasha Henstridge
Jason Statham
Pam Grier
Clea DuVall
Joanna Cassidy
CinematographyGary B. Kibbe
Edited byPaul C. Warschilka
Music byJohn Carpenter
Steve Vai
Buckethead
Robin Finck
Anthrax
Production
company
Storm King Productions
Distributed byScreen Gems
Release date
  • August 24, 2001 (2001-08-24)
Running time
98 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$28 million[1]
Box office$14,010,832[1]

Ghosts of Mars, also known as John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars and sometimes shortened to GOM[2], 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.[3]

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.[1] 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.[4]

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.[5][6][7][8][9][10]

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.[11] The special effects supervisor is credited as "Monkey Overlord."[12]

Filming

Filming took place from 8 August 2000 to 31 October 2000[13] and entirely at night with Metallica playing.[14] 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."[15] Other New Mexico filming locations included White Sands, San Ysidro, Rio Rancho, and in studios in Los Angeles, California.[16]

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.[17]

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.[18]

Plot

By 2176 A.D., 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. There are 640,000 Martian colonists living in in spread-out settlements across the planet, and Martian society has become matriarchal, with women in most positions of authority. The remote mining outpost at Shining Canyon, in the Southern Valley, reports that it has captured the notorious criminal and persistent prison escapee James "Desolation" Williams (Ice Cube), who it is reported has inexplicably turned himself in. Soon after, mass insanity and rioting is reported at Shining Canyon, and then when all communication with the outpost is lost, suspicion is erroneously put down to the presence of Desolation Williams.

At Chryse City, the first human settlement on Mars and now the largest city on the planet, rumors abound and unease grow out of control. The Matriarch Cartel, the ruling body of Chryse City, orders an elite police response squad to infiltrate Shining Canyon by freight train, investigate the situation, retrieve Desolation Williams and escort him back to Chryse for interrogation. The three team leaders consist of squad leader, Commander Helena Braddock (Pam Grier), second-in-command Lieutenant Melanie Ballard (Natasha Henstridge), and Sergeant Nathan Jericho (Jason Statham). 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, 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 red mists which took spiritual or demonic possession of the people. Whitlock was only able to escape by riding away on a weather balloon, but the Martian ghosts followed her to Shining Canyon. The Martian ghosts took over some of the miners there, and led by "Big Daddy Mars" (Richard Cetrone), the possessed ones killed all the others in "vengeance on anyone who tries to lay claim to their planet." The possessed miners undertake heavy tribal tattooing, crude body piercings and commit acts of acts of extreme self-mutilation on themselves, and human sacrifice on any who are not or cannot be possessed. Ballard herself is possessed by a Martian ghost, but Desolation realizes that the ghosts can only inhabit conscious minds, and so keeps Ballard unconscious with sedative drugs. Ballard shares the ghost's memories of a primal and war-like ancient Mars, but the ghost eventually leaves when it realizes that it will not get full possession of her.

When commander Braddock is murdered, her head put on a spike, Ballard must assume command, fight off the savages and escape the outpost. Unfortunately, killing a possessed human merely releases the Martian spirit to possess another human. The team eventually decides to overload Shining Canyon's nuclear reactor to vaporize all of the possessed humans in a nuclear explosion. Ballard's crew, along with survivors who gathered in the jail, are eventually wiped out by the possessed. Only Ballard and Desolation are left after Jericho and the other officers, along with the two train operators, are killed when they try to finish the fight. 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, and the entire Southern Valley, along with all the possessed humans, are 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 together, guns in hand, 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.[19]
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.[20]

Box office

Ghosts of Mars premiered on 24th August 2001.[21] 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.[22] 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.[1]

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."[23] On the Internet Movie Database, the film has a weighted average vote of 4.8 out of 10 by user ratings.[24] BBC Online gives Ghosts of Mars a critics rating of 2 out of 5, with a user rating of 4 out of 5.[25] Metacritic gives Ghosts of Mars a critic's rating of 35%, with a higher user's score of 51%.[26]

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."[27] 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."[28] Harry Guerin of RTE Interactive (Dublin, Ireland) said: "More "Mars lacks" than Mars Attacks, and an outing for Carpenter die-hards only."[29]

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".[30][31][32]

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."[33] 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.[34]

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."[35]

Awards

Ghosts of Mars was nominated for "Best Film" at the 2001 Sitges-Catalonian International Film Festival.[36]

Soundtrack

Untitled
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Filmtracks [37]
SoundtrackNet [38]

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."[39]

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.[40]

Track listing[41]
  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[42], however Carpenter abandoned the project early on as he rarely makes sequels to his films.[43] 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.[44]

References

  1. ^ a b c d John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars at Box Office Mojo
  2. ^ http://www.mania.com/making-ghosts-mars-part-2_article_27346.html
  3. ^ http://www.amazon.com/Ghosts-Mars-Original-Motion-Picture/dp/B00005O54F
  4. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  5. ^ http://www.mbc.net/en/mbc2/articles/Ghosts-of-Mars.html#comment%7Clist
  6. ^ http://horrorcultfilms.co.uk/2012/10/mission-to-mars-2000-ghosts-of-mars-2001-hcf-guilty-pleasure-mars-double-bill/
  7. ^ http://reflectionsonfilmandtelevision.blogspot.co.uk/2009/06/cult-movie-review-john-carpenters.html
  8. ^ http://deadinthesouth.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/ghosts-of-mars.html
  9. ^ https://itunes.apple.com/gb/movie/john-carpenters-ghosts-mars/id282571644
  10. ^ http://badassdigest.com/2011/11/09/schlock-corridor-ghosts-of-mars-2001
  11. ^ http://www.mania.com/making-ghosts-mars-part-2_article_27346.html
  12. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia?tab=cz
  13. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/business
  14. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  15. ^ http://www.mania.com/making-ghosts-mars-part-2_article_27346.html
  16. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/locations
  17. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  18. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/taglines
  19. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  20. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  21. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/releaseinfo
  22. ^ Weekend Box Office Results for August 24-26, 2001 Box Office Mojo
  23. ^ John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars at Rotten Tomatoes
  24. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt
  25. ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2001/11/16/ghosts_of_mars_2001_review.shtml
  26. ^ http://www.metacritic.com/movie/ghosts-of-mars
  27. ^ http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=5345&reviewer=416
  28. ^ http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-08-28/film/market-driven/1/
  29. ^ http://www.rte.ie/ten/2001/1129/ghostsofmars.html
  30. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/trivia
  31. ^ http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/OldShame/Film
  32. ^ http://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=235238&page=21
  33. ^ http://www.cinema-crazed.com/h-q/jc-ghosts.htm
  34. ^ http://www.nickschager.com/nsfp/2011/04/ghosts-of-mars-2001-b.html
  35. ^ http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/ghosts-of-mars-2001
  36. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228333/awards
  37. ^ "Ghosts of Mars (John Carpenter)". Filmtracks. 2001-09-18. Retrieved 2013-01-16.
  38. ^ Other reviews by Messrob Torikian (2003-08-25). "Ghosts Of Mars (2001)". Soundtrack. Retrieved 2013-01-16.
  39. ^ http://www.mania.com/making-ghosts-mars-part-2_article_27346.html
  40. ^ http://www.amazon.com/Ghosts-Mars-Original-Motion-Picture/dp/B00005O54F
  41. ^ "John Carpenter: Ghosts of Mars". Theofficialjohncarpenter.com. Retrieved 2013-01-16.
  42. ^ http://forums.sciflicks.com/showthread.php?t=8179
  43. ^ http://www.joblo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27904
  44. ^ http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ghosts-of-Mars-2-The-Return/101879773229316
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