1. “Some Houses Are Just Born Bad”
This
idea was used in the movies “Rose Red,” “The Haunting” and the remake of “House
on Haunted Hill” and it just makes no sense. It is supposedly to give the house
a presence, but the idea is often abused for the sake of the plot. However, there
is a belief in paranormal studies that houses tend to act as batteries for both
positive and negative emotions and a house with a particular turbulent or
violent history can tend to invoke the feelings of its past on witnesses even
long after the fact. In the movies, the reference is always on the house as if
it was its fault.
2. “The Angry Lone Nut Theory”
Most ghost movies always seem to have one
person who sometimes turns out to be psychic and often knows way too much about
the history of the house and usually is only available to speed the story along
so the main characters don’t have to do any research. Sometimes, the accompanying
flashback just interferes in the flow of the plot or even contradicts the facts
established in the present.
3. “I See Dead People”
“The Sixth Sense” actually did it right, but
“Casper” was the worst offender. Real ghosts don’t talk one on one with the
living. They usually linger confusingly in the shadows and rarely take a form
that can actually be seen. Two of the all time best ghost movies, “Legend of
Hell House” and “The Haunting,” scared moviegoers with ghosts that were never
seen. Such occasions as the remake of “Thirteen Ghosts” and “The Haunted
Mansion” would never happen. There are a few random cases of individuals who
encountered flesh and blood people they later realized could not have existed,
but Hollywood seems to perpetuate the fact that ghosts are just dead people
without bodies. (By the way, ghosts are not the dead or the undead; they are
the spirits of the dead.)
“The
dead don’t talk, but their spirits do.”
4. “Screw Reality, People Want Special Effects!”
Little girls don’t get sucked into
televisions. Houses don’t turn into monsters. Flesh-devouring creatures made of
shadows don’t exist and neither does alien entities from other dimensions. Inanimate
objects don’t come to life (although they might move under their own power).
Zombies and the living dead don’t burst from walls or basements (even when a
house IS built on a forgotten cemetery).
5. “And That’s That…”
Some of the time,
the house or location gets destroyed in order to provide a grand finish. In “The
Hauntings of Sea Cliff Manor,” the house burned down. In the remake of “House
on Haunted Hill,” rooms and halls blew up. In “The Crying Child,” the house
blew up. In “Lost Voyage,” the ship was sucked into another dimension, as was
the house in “Poltergeist.” The ships were sunk in “Triangle” and “Ghost Ship.”
“Legend of Hell House” and “The Haunting,” two of the best haunted house movies
that can be seen, the houses were left standing as the house remained standing
as a dangling plot thread that was left unanswered. Sometimes, the ghosts get
exorcised or released from a curse and the movie ends on a happy note. It just
doesn’t happen.
(A few more
Hollywood snafus)
6. Incessant cursing and swearing. (Not everybody
talks as if they were sailors and truck drivers).
7. Blood and Guts (What does this have to do
with ghosts?)
8. Re-Write Historical Events (In “Ghost Ship,”
the facts on the Mary Celeste were completely wrong.)
9. Tagged on scenes of nudity or sex (Usually
used to cover up a weak or boring spot in the plot).
10. A twist or nonsensical ending that skews an
already confusing storyline or just robs the impact the movie could have made.
(Jack Nicholson’s face in the photo in “The Shining,” the elimination of the entire
cast in “Burnt Offerings,” Jack Ferriman in “Ghost Ship,”)