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Review of Ghost Ship (John Frizzell)

FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:

Buy it... if only about five minutes of truly engaging, memorable horror and resolution music is worth another roughly thirty cues of predictable genre cliches.

Avoid it... if you, like most viewers, seek the song performances that were most prominently featured in the film, for this otherwise lengthy album omits the majority of them.

FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:

Ghost Ship: (John Frizzell) A haunted house thriller set at sea, Ghost Ship is not surprisingly shallow in character development and reliant instead on a plethora of poorly illuminated sets. Featuring an average cast (with more than its fair share of television medical drama veterans), the film took the tired story of a ghost ship lost at sea with a treasure onboard and twisted it into a stylish and mysterious thriller for the salvage team that discovers it all too easily. The fact that the name of this fictional ship, Antonia Graza, and its fate are an obvious suggestion of the true to life cruise liner Andrea Doria, not to mention the countless fallacies of logic that exist before the apparitions even begin to appear and the carnage begins, is irritatingly unsatisfying. Following a series of sub-standard scores for regrettable films, John Frizzell was still showing signs of creative promise in with horror flicks like Thirteen Ghosts. By late 2002, the composer collaborated once again with director Steve Beck to produce a massive score for Ghost Ship in the same genre and then surprise audiences with a magnificent effort for Gods and Generals in early 2003. Unfortunately, the film and score suffered the same deficiencies in terms of anonymity and the exploration of more subplots than could be adequately fleshed out and resolved at the end. Frizzell's score was forced to complete with far more memorable song placements in the film, not to mention the mixing of sound effects that often obscured what few interesting subtleties exist in the music. The irony in the fact that most casual viewers of the film remember only the songs exists in the scope of the score, which is enormous in size and quantity. Stylistically, Frizzell tap dances around some old genre cliches while diving head first into others, producing a score with drama, fright, and a slight hint of elegance at times as well. His score utilizes every conceivable choice of instrumentation, from the full symphony to a solo female voice and an array of synthesized elements. Unfortunately for Frizzell, all of these performers go unguided for the majority of the work, leaving the overall composition as a wandering, lost soul. Although on some level perhaps this ungrounded technique in structure is warranted given the plot of Ghost Ship, a lack of concrete motifs and memorable orchestration (despite the promising ingredients) is a blow from which the score cannot recover. With all the elements in place, Frizzell's mistake was his choice to restrain the score from inhabiting a single, memorable sense of continuity.

The absence of some measure of motif or full theme meant to add coherence to the film and score makes the work a "thrill of the moment" wall of sound in its heavier cues and borderline dull in its few sensitive or quietly suspenseful moments. The score's only identity is a basic, slightly dramatic theme of rising figures that likely represents the dead in the story, hinted at in "The Discovery" and unleashed in "The Souls Ascend." The action music is highly engaging in a fashion similar to Joel McNeely's Virus, especially in the cue that introduces the salvage ship, "The Arctic Warrior." The synthetic and vocal additions are often used to create sufficient ambience, but they are mixed into a slushy orchestral base that never establishes its own thread of personality. The waterlogged and metallic style of manipulation in the edit gives the work an appropriate sense of atmosphere, though these elements are generally used in such a dissonant fashion as to detract from the listening experience. Frizzell even presents the cue "The Ballroom Reverts" seemingly backwards, though if you reverse it yourself with editing software, it sounds just as obnoxious. Such is the frustration with Ghost Ship, a score that perpetually exists on the verge of some whopping, fantastic statement but always falters and redirects in the next cue. This trend is painfully obvious on album, with no less than 39 score cues provided, totaling 74 minutes. The rich, prominent finale cue, when combined with a couple of other singular moments of note in the work, will yield five to ten minutes of interesting material. Having so much of the remaining anonymous music present, the most vibrant sequences of Frizzell's work are lost. Viewers of the film will likely dismiss the orchestral score and migrate towards discussion about the three song uses in the film. One of these is actually partly a Frizzell composition; "My Little Box" is performed by Gabriel Mann during a flashback scene and features an abrasive and disruptive electric guitar and vocal style that doesn't match the rest of the score. Missing from the album is the opening vintage Italian jazz song "Senza Fine", sung by Monica Mancini (who did not make an appearance in the film), but the piece can be found on her "Cinema Paradiso" album. Additionally, the Mudvayne song "Not Falling" (heard at the end of the film) is also absent. Most who initially purchased this album expressed their displeasure over the absence of those latter two songs, though Frizzel's contribution to Ghost Ship likely won't please many film score collectors either. This album is living proof that too much score can indeed detract from the potential of a soundtrack product.  **

TRACK LISTINGS:

Total Time: 73:55

• 1. The Discovery (1:51) • 2. Falling Apart (1:55) • 3. The Arctic Warrior (1:37) • 4. The Deal (3:16) • 5. The Antonia Graza (3:18) • 6. Welcome Aboard (1:53) • 7. How's it Going up There (0:56) • 8. Falling Through (0:55) • 9. Touring the Ship (2:14) • 10. The Marie Celeste (1:36) • 11. I Saw a Little Girl (1:45) • 12. No Unexpected Guests (2:12) • 13. Bullet Holes (1:08) • 14. Carina di Capitano (0:52) • 15. Katie Appears (1:47) • 16. Meeting the Captain (2:44) • 17. The Bodies (1:23) • 18. Francesca Appears (1:29) • 19. The Freezer (1:10) • 20. Finding Gold (1:10)

• 21. Work to Do (1:53) • 22. Santos Dies (1:21) • 23. My Little Box* (4:09) • 24. Go to Hell (1:55) • 25. Bon Appetite (1:58) • 26. Katie's Dolls (1:22) • 27. The Ballroom Reverts (1:37) • 28. Francesca's Theme (1:00) • 29. Epps Meets Katie (1:44) • 30. Survivor (1:12) • 31. Katie Disappears (1:14) • 32. The Fight (2:33) • 33. Repairs (1:29) • 34. Underwater (1:59) • 35. Greer's Body (0:59) • 36. Murphy's Body (1:19) • 37. I Guess It's Over (5:33) • 38. The Graza Explodes (0:39) • 39. The Souls Ascend (3:24)

NOTES & QUOTES:

The insert includes minimal performance credits and no extra information about the score or film.

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The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from Ghost Ship are Copyright © 2002, Varèse Sarabande and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 6/17/03 and last updated 2/18/09.