The Frighteners: Director's Cut

Peter Jackson's The Frighteners was released in the summer of 1996 to an uncaring, overcrowded American box office and tanked miserably. I'd chalk much of the film's failure up to poor marketing, that made it look too much like a dopey comedy, which is sure to turn off the genre fans (read: horror and cult movie fans) to whom a film like The Frighteners normally appeals. But, bear in mind, as well, that the film contains no large, marketable stars, comes from a man who was, at that time, a thoroughly unknown commodity in The States, and boasts an R rating despite having a somewhat bawdy, juvenile sense of humor.

So, to be fair, it's a tough sell.

Over the years, Jackson has developed somewhat more brand awareness, mainly due to a small series of personal independant films you may have heard of called Lord of the Rings. So people have gone back and discovered what I knew back in the summer of 1996, when I saw this film in the movie theaters. The Frighteners is a great, silly, frenetic, dazzling, unabashedly twisted horror-comedy with terrific early CG effects, several endearing comic performances and just the right amount of bloody gore and violence.



Unlike Jackson's Lord of the Rings films, I can't say it benefits tremendously from the extended cut featured on the new DVD. While the Extended Edition Lord of the Rings films add much-needed nuance, depth, texture and detail, all the Director's Cut of The Frighteners gives you are a few throwaway gags and a couple extra effects shots. Don't get me wrong...As a longtime fan of the film, it's fun for me to see some of the stuff that didn't make the final cut.. And one shot that was cut out, featuring a ghost walking in front of a light bulb, is as trippy and interesting an image as anything in the finished film.

But this is more a treat for the fans than a truly neccessary or crucial addition of material.

That being said, the movie is every bit as technically impressive as it was upon its debut. When the film was made, in 1995, CG was still relatively new on the scene. Jackson's New Zealand effects house, WETA, hadn't even used computer effects in their previous films - cult and indie classics Dead Alive, Bad Taste, Heavenly Creatures, Meet the Feebles and others. In the introduction to the film on the new DVD, Jackson implies that his initial work with CG effects on The Frighteners inspired him to take on the even more ambitious Lord of the Rings films.

There are a few shots that date the film, effects-wise. A sequence in which a ghost pops up through a persian rug to strangle a woman looks a bit pixellated and cartoonish, and some of the movement is still too smooth to achieve anything approaching photorealism. But the overall look and texture of the film are completely solid, and many of the sequences rank among the most creative and stylish CG artist have yet completed.

And for a mid-90's film, The Frighteners sure does rely on a lot of computer effects. The story of fradulent psychic detective Frank Bannister (Fox) who teams up with a young widow (Trini Alvarado) and a trio of bumbling spirits (Jim Fyfe, Chi McBride, John Astin) to defeat an undead serial murderer (Jake Busey) and his psycho girlfriend (Dee Wallace Stone), The Frighteners only has a few characters that aren't created through CG. Spectral, iridescent ghosts populate the entire film, moving easily through objects and interacting with their live-action surroundings.

The movie really is a marvel of design. The sets are moody and atmospheric, the cinematography is playful and expressive, the violence is quick and shocking and Danny Elfman's score bounces joyfully along from kill to kill, and gag to gag.

The film's humor really worked for me back in '96, and I still think Jackson's earlier films are hilarious, but The Frighteners has a decidedly teenage boy-themed sense of humor. To be honest, I started to find it a bit grating. The ghost characters in particular are awful schticky, which not only drags down the film's first half but also makes it harder to accept them as real characters later on down the road.

The fact is, the film's goofball antics clash with the severity and intensity of its horror storyline. This is a story about a man who is haunted, both literally and figuratively, after the brutal death of his wife. It's about a serial killer on a violent rampage through a small town. I can see why Jackson would want to inject some dark humor into the movie, and Michael J. Fox does a good job of making Frank Bannister a charming, memorable character, but a lot of the comedy beats simply aren't that funny.

The only performer to really connect with the film's loopy sensibility is Jeffrey Combs, best remembered as the mad scientist from Re-Animator. Combs' character, a deeply troubled FBI agent obsessed with pinning murders on Frank, is the only one to successfully combine The Frighteners taste for the creepy and bizarre with its mordant sense of humor. He's not brought in until late in the movie, but Combs' rather brilliant turn holds the entire third act together. (R. Lee Ermey, the drill sergeant from Full Metal Jacket, also has a fun little cameo as, well, um, as a ghost drill sergeant).

I haven't had a chance to look at the 4+ hours of bonus material on the DVD, but I'm sure I'll dig into that stuff eventually. Much of it is taken from the infamous Frighteners Laserdisc, one of the rarest and most sought-after of all Laserdiscs, so it already has a good reputation as far as behind-the-scenes footage goes. As for the film, it demands to be seen by any fan of Jackson's style or the horror-comedy genre, and doesn't disappoint even a decade after its initial release.