GHOST TOWN: REVIEW
Laughter
is the greatest escape of all. Throw in a little romance and you have a perfect
feel-good film. 'Ghost Town', starring British comedian Ricky Gervais is just
that - perfect family friendly Hollywood fluff.
In his first
major leading role, Gervias plays the grouchy dentist, Bertram Pincus. A long-time
single, he lives in isolation as a Manhattan bachelor who ignores everyone in
existence - even taking to stuffing his patients mouths with plaster cast just
to keep them quiet. We first meet this misanthropic recluse avoiding an office
party, then ignoring his neighbours within the apartment block in which he resides
proving his inept social skills from the outset are sheer repulsive to many.
Pincus
finds out he will need to undergo a colonoscopy - a procedure that sets up the
ultimate humiliation on himself with an array of probing jokes. Gervais extracts
every possible laugh with his open-minded delivery of insults. The unnecessary
demand of total anaesthetic by Pincus makes his experience a seven minute death
experience that upon awakening, gives him a totally unwanted gift. This very grumpy
individual now has a chance to help people, dead people. Pincus can see and talk
to ghosts who haunt the city and one in particular needs closure.
A
victim of a high speed bus, now a smooth and sophisticated spirit, consults the
dentist to help halt the upcoming nuptials of his widow Gwen (Tea Leonie) to a
shady character leading two lives. No stranger to mischief himself, the former
husband uses Pincus to apologise for his womanising ways. This sets up redemption
and transformation for the recluse who has ignored the widow in question, a fellow
resident in his building in times of need many times before.
A
great performance by Greg Kinnear ('Little Miss Sunshine') as the insistent dead
husband prompts Gervais with many of his smart one-liners and abrupt proverbs.
An unseen softer side begins to appear for the dentist around the attractive Gwen
setting up a conventional Hollywood ending that is apparent as soon as we see
Pincus crack a smile. This is one for the romantics.
After
his excellent television shows 'The Office' & the must see 'Extras', Ricky
Gervais makes this a worthy, if not brilliant, start to his leading man status
on the big screen.
Shane A. Bassett
