Judas Ghost

It really was much better than I expected! Granted, I came in expecting a 4.7 IMDB, movie.

I found it very entertaining. Not the scariest of horror films but enough; likewise, light on fantasy but enough. It's a bit lower budget, and this shows with some of the effects and a few points during the acting.

I don't know, I just enjoyed it. As far as this type of movie with this rating, it's at the top; much better than the rest of this fare.

The only real drawback is the lack of backstory. It drops you right in cold but explains it throughout the movie. This can work in movies, I just felt it a touch ham-handed here.

All that being said, again, watch it.

A lot of people really don't understand the movie. To be fair Simon Green wrote this in such a way that unless you are familiar with his shared universe, i.e. The Nightside, Ghost Finders and Secret Histories books, it doesn't make as much sense. The Ghost Finder novels were fantasy-mystery stories not horror. The books revolved around finding the cause of various paranormal occurrences and resolving them. They also fought a competing organization that wanted to exploit ghosts.

The magic they use in the movie is a result of the universe he created that included magic, gods, demons and any number of other creatures and powers hidden from the general public. The team is a fairly accurate replica of his Ghost Finder team in the books. Although the tech person isn't nearly as nervous in the books. There was usually more humour in the books as well. I have a distinct feeling that he was pressured into the ending since it differs so much from all his books.

If you approach the movie as a non-horror fantasy it actually works quite well, although the ending wasn't very satisfying.

Overall a good try at capturing a very difficult and intricate universe on film. There are 30 books in the various series and they share a common universe, there's no way to set it up in one film. The Ghost Finder books were written after the other two series were well underway and they kind of assumed a familiarity on the part of the reader with the universe.

I've been watching a lot of these 'ghost chaser' type movies lately... a lot of them are first person and often feature a group of amateurs who aren't really expecting much to happen... then get in over their heads. Judas Ghost differs in that the protagonists are supposedly seasoned professionals who have dealt with many verified hauntings along an established spectrum of difficulty/danger. In that way they're more like the academics in Ghostbusters than the dumb college kids in The Blair Witch Project. Also, seeing as the supernatural is an established and 'known' thing going in for these characters it does away with any chicanery of verisimilitude... it's pure fantasy from the get-go. The 'psychic' character is as powerful and reliable as their technology. Their techniques are scientific and magical. In a way, it's a bit more like a low-powered superhero movie or an episode of Dr. Who. And like Dr. Who, it felt a lot like a low budget TV show.

All in all, it wasn't very interesting and certainly not suspenseful or scary. Not particularly gory either. The writing is adequate but pedestrian. The acting is good enough. The special effects are TV quality and, again, adequate. It would be passable as a standard episode of some second-string occult show like Friday The 13th: The Series but as a movie? It's pretty weak stuff.

It was difficult to mark this movie, because it would not be right to give it high marks as a HORROR movie, because that would get people's expectations up. And this is not a good HORROR movie, in the sense of creepy atmosphere, excitement, good scares etc.. It is not creepy at all, the special effects are very crude and simple, the "ghost" is so obviously a person in stage make-up, the "blood" is so obviously paint etc.. There are no good scares at all. It is very low budget, and it is more like a filmed stage play than a movie.

But on the other hand: if you accept this as a stage play about a typical ghost hunt situation, and do not expect it to be "The Orphanage" or "The Others" - then it is in fact quite good! The script and dialogue are intelligent, and the actors are good too.

I don't normally go for most of the films like this that have been coming out recently (and there have been a TON of them) but once in a while I do find one entertaining. I think what appealed to me about this movie were the consistent 'rules' of Good vs. Evil that held it's story together for most of the time. I'm a real sucker for strong religious 'Mythologies' such as the Classic Cross, Holy Water, etc. Anything from the Classic Hammer Horror films to more recent movies that are based upon a ritualistic 'formula', or the 'belief' you have to have in order to carry out what they want to do, such as 'THE SKELETON KEY' or even the entertaining 'FRIGHT NIGHT' {the original film}

Another thing that I thought was kind of interesting was this 'Institute' that clearly was an established center for studies into these kinds of Phenomena. I liked how this Institute came across as some distant Entity that was watching and perhaps knew more about why they were there than they did. It just gave a tad more menace and mystery to the atmosphere.

For this kind of EXTREMELY limited film, a LOT really rides on the way it is done, the way it is acted, and how well it is written. I thought they held it together pretty well right up until just about the 55 minute mark where, to me anyway, the story took a bit of a dive in believability. Primarily concerning how a couple of the characters suddenly reacted to the circumstances. A bit of a shame, really, because I can truly say that it genuinely had me right up to that moment.

Prior to that point in the film, I felt that the suspense and quality of the acting were fairly decent. I won't give anything away, but I really liked some of the simple tactics that the 'Hall' employed to keep the people off balance. I read in some other reviews on other sites that the lead guy came across as too arrogant. But, I thought he had just the right tone of confidence. VERY similar I thought to the way that Jeffrey Combs comes across in roles like this. And, I REALLY like him. Heh... he even kind of looked like him a little. No, I thought he just came across as a guy who really felt like he knew his stuff in doing this kind of work, that's all. But, in the hands of another actor, I can see where just a little too much that way and he would have come across as really stupid.

If you are like me (and, God help you if you are...) and you like a simple 'Good vs. Evil' story told in a Classic kind of way with the Classic Mythologies firmly in place, you might enjoy this movie somewhat. BUT... like I mentioned, and thus the reason why I only gave it a rating of '6', I honestly feel that the last 20 minutes or so REALLY harms the effectiveness and the suspension of disbelief that the film makers had worked very hard to develop up to that point. And, that is something that is ESSENTIAL for a film like this. But, up to that moment, I genuinely enjoyed the Mystery of it all, the clever things that the 'Hall' did, and the somewhat intriguing Institute with it's ambiguous motives as to why they were really there...