Final Film Critique - Ghost

Final Film Critique

The movie "Ghost" is one of those love stories that makes you want to watch it over and over again. A rather simple story that shows you just how strong love can be, even after a person dies. The movie "Ghost" captures your heart and keeps the viewer wanting more. In the next few pages I will take a deep look into this classic movie. I will take a look at the story, actors, cinematography, editing, sound, style and directing, impact of society on the film, genre, realist approach, and the overall textural theme of the film. I have always been a bit of a skeptic on if ghosts truly exist. Could this movie make me believer?

The story of "Ghost" is that of a true love story. Sam and Molly are two individuals who are deeply in love. You see their love story unfold from the beginning of the movie. After a night at the theater they are walking home arm in arm when Sam is tragically mugged and murdered. Sam finds himself trapped as a ghost and realizes very soon that his death was not an accident. He soon finds out that Molly is in extreme danger. Since no one can see or hear him he decides to try to communicate through a psychic, Oda Mae Brown. Bringing these characters alive is an important part of the movie.

The actors are the people we see make the movie unfold. "Actors are critical in bringing a character to life for the audience by interpreting the intentions of the writer and director. But an actor is also a tool of the director, really just one more part of the scene that helps to tell the story to the audience." (Goodykoontz, B. & Jacobs, C. P. (2011). The main actors in "Ghost" are Patrick Swayze who plays the character Sam, Demi Moore who plays the character Molly, and Whoopi Goldberg who plays the character Oda Mae Brown. I would say that all three of these actors would be classified as wildcards. "If an actor who is difficult to classify as one certain type, often because he or she can play a wide variety of characters equally well without becoming typecast would be classified as wildcards." (Goodykoontz, B. & Jacobs, C. P. (2011). Each of these actors in my opinion has been in so many different kinds of movies that they would not fit into one category. Patrick Swayze has been in a wide variety of roles such as "Dirty Dancing", "Donnie Darko", and "Point Break", all very different roles. Demi Moore has been in such movies as "A Few Good Men", "GI Jane" and "Striptease" all extremely different roles. Whoopi Goldberg has been in roles such as "Sister Act", "Star Trek" and "Made in America." All three of these actors are very diverse in their roles and play all different kinds of roles. I believe that these three actors were casted for the perfect roles. I cannot imagine watching this movie with different actors. These three actors bring the characters alive and make you believe that they are actually these characters and not simply actors. Along with the actors the cinematography is also an important element of this movie.

From the opening scene you can tell that this movie was filmed some time ago. There is nothing fancy about the shots of this movie but I feel that the movie does not need a lot of fancy shots to make it an effective film. The shots are a bit jerky from what I can tell. A lot of the shots are a bit sudden and fast in nature. I feel that the shots could have been a lot smoother. Lighting is very effective in this film. The scene where he is dying the viewer sees the bright lights to make you believe he is passing over into another life and dying. The movie uses bright lights to show life and at certain times you see the movie turn kind of dark and I feel this gives the movie a sense of death. The thing about this movie is it is kept simple. There is not any need for special effects or fancy scenes because the story is very simple. I feel that if the movie had these elaborate scenes it would have taken away from the overall movie. Sometimes when a movie has elaborate scenes the viewer can get lost in the scene and not really enjoy the movie. I feel that this is one of those simple movies that does not need a lot of bells and whistles to tell the love story. Next my focus will be on the editing style I saw present in this film.

Just like the cinematographer, the editor also has an important role in filmmaking. This is the person who decides what we will actually see in the movie and what will be cut out. It is important not to cut out too much but it is also important to show just enough so that the viewer gets the entire story. I believe that this movie was shot in the chronological order. This movie is easy to follow and seems to go in the sequence of events in the chronological order. I feel that this is an effective way for this movie because you do not get confused. Sometimes movies can get confusing because they jump around and are hard to follow. In this movie each scene unfolds and leads to the next scene making the movie easy to watch and not confusing at all. Even with Sam's character being a ghost and not really being seen by the rest of the characters you do not seem to forget that aspect. Along with editing, sound also plays an important role in the filmmaking process

I feel that the sounds and music in this film are effective. You get the sense that this is a love story from the very beginning. There is a scene when Molly wakes up because she cannot sleep. She decides to do some pottery and Sam wakes up to help her. This scene is very intense and sexual. A love song starts to play to show that this is going to be a sexual scene. There are other scenes where music dictates which type of scene we are about to