While cooped up during this pandemic, take a look into the abstruse corners of Netflix or YouTube Movies.
Obscure Movie Review explores films that are more-or-less mainstream (or at least supposed to be), with actors and directors you've heard of, but flew under the radar.
What do you get when you combine; the future director of one of the biggest fantasy franchises of all time; the star of a beloved sci-fi trilogy; and special effects that looked great when new, but have aged quite well? Surprisingly, you get something that barely made a ripple.
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A matter of life and death
The Frighteners is a 1996 horror comedy by Peter Jackson, the Kiwi director who was half a decade away from giving the world the first installment of the Lord of the Rings.
It stars Michael J Fox as Frank Bannister, a ghost-buster of sorts, and even though is the real deal who can see and talk to the dead - he's also a shyster. Because the "hauntings" he's called to are caused by spirits he's befriended, performing the paranormal activity in peoples' homes and leaving his business card.
One such target is young couple Lucy (Trini Alvarado) and Ray Lynskey (Peter Dobson), who've just moved to Fairwater. But soon Ray becomes one of the latest locals to suffer a fatal - and totally improbable - heart attack.
More of the town's dark history is revealed when physician Lucy makes a house call to the home of Patricia Bradley (Dee Wallace Stone), the girlfriend of executed serial killer Johnny Bartlett (Jake Busey).
And with more unlikely cardiac cases occurring, Bannister - who sees the sufferers being attacked by a Grim Reaper figure - becomes a suspect of FBI agent Milton Dammers (Jeffrey Combs).
All of these threads are then woven together for a life-and-death finale.
You probably noticed...
The fictional town of Fairwater is supposed to be Midwestern America.
However, given it's a Peter Jackson movie, it was actually filmed entirely in New Zealand. Mostly on the north island, including in Wellington, although the town of Lyttelton (near Christchurch) was also a shooting location.
If you look closely at the background of the street scene when Bannister is confronted by Ray's ghost, you can see a First National Real Estate logo on one of the buildings. A brand you're unlikely to see in the USA.
What's in a song?
The feature song of The Frighteners soundtrack is 'Don't Feat The Reaper' - but not the more famous, original version by Blue Oyster Cult.
Remember this was a film by Peter Jackson, who you're listening to here is New Zealand alternative rockers The Mutton Birds.
And if the score sounds a bit Simpsons-esque, that's because it's by Danny Elfman. Although, given he's also done a over a dozen Tim Burton movies, he was a good fit for the tone of this project.
Why is it obscure?
The Frighteners opened in the Northern Hemisphere summer to soft box office figures. In the end it made just over $29m against a budget of $26m.
This was mostly put down to its release coinciding with the 1996 Olympics, with Americans paying more attention to these games as they were held in Atlanta. Along with competition from the juggernaut that was Independence Day.
Critics either enjoyed it and heaped praise on the effects, or didn't like the tonal shifts and pointed to the effects being too much. The film holds a 63 per cent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
One would think that after Ghostbusters they'd be an appetite for a film such as this. Although it is darker and the subject of death is front-and-centre - and it is an area that's notorious for making people uncomfortable.
And where the Ghostbusters movies deal with unnamed spectres - or a demi-god or 16th century tyrant - the spirits of The Frighteners are actual fleshed-out characters, most of which are seen alive during the film.
Being a tonally dark film, it's worth noting that Fox's darker or more dramatic movies, such as Casualties of War and Light of Day, don't tend to perform as well.
OBSCURE MOVIE REVIEWS RATINGS:
- Hidden Gem - the highest rating, a genuinely good movie that shouldn't be obscure;
- Missed Opportunity - a flawed movie that had potential but fell short for whatever reason;
- Guilty Pleasure - not a good movie, but enjoyable, think 'so bad it's good';
- Best Forgotten - obscure for a reason, don't bother with it.
The verdict
HIDDEN GEM
The Frighteners is a fantastic film.
Yes, the tone bounces around a bit, being a 'horror comedy', but it's packaged together so well that it works. You're completely drawn into this fictional American town that's actually New Zealand.
It's full of larger-than-life characters because every performance is strong, particularly the leading pair of Fox and Alvarado. Sadly this was a milestone, in that it's Fox's final starring role in a live-action film before he stepped back due to his Parkinson's.
The special effects, which were cutting edge at the time, have held up surprisingly well. And while they might not look as technically impressive these days, they still look good enough that they don't take you out of the movie (like the submarine scene in Escape From LA, that came out the same year).
On paper The Frighteners should've been one of the biggest films of the 1990s. It certainly deserves a better legacy than to be buried and forgotten.
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