The Frighteners
Encyclopedia
The Frighteners is a 1996 comedy horror
film directed by Peter Jackson
and co-written with his wife, Fran Walsh
. The film's cast includes Michael J. Fox
, Trini Alvarado
, John Astin
, Jeffrey Combs
, Dee Wallace, Jake Busey
and Chi McBride
. The Frighteners tells the story of Frank Bannister (Fox), an architect who develops psychic abilities allowing him to see, hear, and communicate with ghosts after his wife's murder. He initially uses his new abilities to work with various spirits to cheat money out of customers for his "ghosthunting" business. However, the spirit of a mass murder
er comes back from Hell, able to attack the living and the dead, prompting Frank to investigate the supernatural presence.
Jackson and Walsh conceived the idea for The Frighteners during the scriptwriting phase of Heavenly Creatures
. Robert Zemeckis
hired the duo to write the script, with the original intention of Zemeckis directing The Frighteners as a spin-off
film of the television series, Tales from the Crypt
. With Jackson and Walsh's first draft submitted in January 1994, Zemeckis believed the film would be better off directed by Jackson, produced by Zemeckis and funded/distributed by Universal Pictures
. The visual effects were created by Jackson's Weta Digital
, which had only been in existence for three years. This, plus the fact that The Frighteners required more digital effects shots than almost any movie made up until that time, resulted in the eighteen-month period for effects work by Weta Digital being largely stressed.
Despite a rushed post-production
schedule, Universal Pictures was so impressed with Jackson's rough cut
on The Frighteners, the studio moved the theatrical release date closer by four months. The film was not a box office
success, but received generally positive reviews from critics. The Frighteners is also Michael J. Fox's last leading role in a live-action feature film; Fox then went on to a four-year run on the television series Spin City
before semi-retiring in 2000 due to the effects of Parkinson's disease
.
from the Old West called the Judge. Cyrus, Stuart and the Judge haunt houses in the area to accumulate work for Frank's ghostbusting business; Frank then "exorcises" the houses for a fee, even though he is depicted by locals as a con man
. Five years later, Dr. Lucy Lynskey summons Frank, who recently conned her and her husband Ray. Frank discovers that Ray has been killed (just after he left), and an encounter with his ghost leads Frank to discover that an entity resembling the Grim Reaper is killing people and marking numbers on their foreheads that only the psychic can see.
Frank tries helping the people whom the Reaper is targeting because his wife Debra died with a similar number, 13, carved into her forehead. Because Frank can see the numbers ahead of time he can foretell the murders, but this puts him under suspicion with the police and FBI agent Milton Dammers. Highly anal and disturbed from years of undercover work, Dammers is convinced that Frank is responsible for the killings, using some sort of psychic power to stop the hearts of those he subconsciously wishes dead while creating the visage of the Grim Reaper to absolve himself of guilt. Frank is captured and detained after the town's newspaper editor, Madga, who despised Frank's reputation, is killed. While Frank is being detained, Lucy begins to investigate the murders and becomes a target of the Reaper. She is attacked while visiting Frank in jail, but they the manage to escape with the help of Cyrus and Stuart, who are both killed in the process. Frustrated by his inability to fight the Reaper in a mortal body, Frank wants to commit suicide so he can stop the Reaper's killing spree. Instead, Lucy helps Frank have a near death experience by entering hypothermia and using barbiturates to stop his heart. Dammers abducts Lucy, then confesses that he had been a victim of Charles Manson
and his "Family" in 1969. Frank appears to come to Lucy's aid. In his ghostly form, Frank confronts the Reaper and discovers that the killer is the ghost of Johnny Bartlett (Jake Busey
), a hospital orderly who killed 12 people in a killing spree, where he worked, 32 years ago, then died in the electric chair
.
Frank reveals Bartlett's true form, but his spirit is forced back into his body by Lucy resuscitating him. After learning the Reaper's identity, Lucy worries that Patricia will become one of Bartlett's targets. She goes to Patricia's house and discovers that Patricia is on friendly terms with Bartlett's ghost, who tells her to kill Lucy. Patricia kills her mother and tries to kill Lucy, but Frank rescues her. Lucy and Frank trap Bartlett's spirit in his urn
, which they find in Patricia's room. Hoping to take the ashes to holy ground, they run for the chapel of the now-abandoned psychiatric hospital to send Bartlett's ghost to Hell
. Frank realizes that this is the hospital where the original crimes were committed, helplessly reliving the events of Bartlett's killing spree in flashback visions, while Patricia, armed with a shotgun, and Dammers chase them through the ruins. Dammers throws the ashes away, releasing Bartlett's ghost again before his head is blown off by Patricia. Bartlett's ghost and Patricia hunt down Frank and Lucy. Frank realizes that Bartlett's ghost drove the two off the road and killed Frank's wife. Patricia used Frank's utility knife
to cut the number into her forehead.
Out of bullets, Patricia strangles Frank with the shotgun, then prepares to kill Lucy. Frank's spirit, however, returns and rips Patricia's spirit from her body, dragging her up the Corridor of Life (the passage to Heaven) with him. Bartlett grabs Patricia's ghost, while Frank makes it to Heaven, where he's reunited with Cyrus and Stuart. The three watch as Bartlett and Patricia's spirits are dragged to Hell. After meeting Debra's spirit, Frank learns it is not yet his time and is sent back to his body (Cyrus tells him to start living and Debra asks him to be happy), waking up in Lucy's arms. Frank and Lucy fall in love, and due to her experiences, Lucy can now see ghosts as well. Frank returns to being an architect, demolishing the dream house for his wife that he never finished and building a life with Lucy. As for Dammers, he is a spirit, riding around in the back of Sheriff Walt Perry's car.
Peter Jackson
cameos as a man with piercings. Melanie Lynskey
cameos as a deputy. R. Lee Ermey
cameos as the Ghost of Sgt. Hiles.
and wife/co-writer Fran Walsh
conceived the idea for The Frighteners in 1992, during the scriptwriting phase of Heavenly Creatures
. Together, they wrote a three-page film treatment
and sent it to their talent agent
in Hollywood. Robert Zemeckis
viewed their treatment with the intention of directing The Frighteners as a spin-off
film of the television series, Tales from the Crypt
(which he helped produce). Zemeckis hired Jackson and Walsh to turn their treatment into a full-length screenplay in January 1993. The husband and wife duo completed their first draft for The Frighteners in early-January 1994. Zemeckis was so impressed with their script, he decided The Frighteners would work better directed by Jackson, executive produced by Zemeckis and funded/distributed by Universal Pictures
. Universal greenlight
ed the film to commence pre-production
on a $26 million budget in April 1994. The studio also granted Jackson and Zemeckis total artistic control
and the right of final cut privilege
.
. Principal photography
began on May 14, 1995 and lasted until November 16, which is one of the longest shooting schedule
s Universal Pictures ever approved of. Six weeks into the shoot, cinematographer
Alun Bollinger
had a serious car accident. His replacement, John Blick, later alternated duties with Bollinger for much of the rest of the shoot. Location shooting
primarily included Wellington
and three weeks spent in Lyttelton
. Interior scenes were compiled at Camperdown Studios in Miramar
.
created the visual effects, which included computer-generated imagery
, as well as scale model
s (which were necessary to make Wellington
look American), prosthetic makeup
and practical effects with help from Weta Workshop
. Visual effects supervisor
Richard Taylor explained that effects work on The Frighteners was complex due to Weta's inexperience with computer technology in the mid-1990s. Prior to this film, Weta worked largely with physical effects
. With so many ghosts among its main cast, The Frighteners required more digital effects shots than almost any movie made up till that time. For a special effects company that had been in existence less than three years, the eighteen-month period for completing The Frighteners was largely stressful. Some shots were handled by a small New Zealand company called Pixel Perfect, many of whose employees would eventually join Weta Digital. Rick Baker was hired to design the prosthetic makeup for The Judge, portrayed by John Astin
(the detachable jawbone was later added digitally). However, Baker was not able to apply Astin's five hours of makeup himself due to his commitment on The Nutty Professor
. Makeup artist Brian Penikas (Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) fulfilled Baker's duties.
The extended shooting schedule for The Frighteners owed much to the fact that scenes where ghosts and human characters interacted had to be filmed twice; once with human characters acting on set, and then with the ghost characters acting against a blue screen
. The two elements would later be digitally composited into one shot with the use of split screen photography. Such sequences required precise timing from the cast as they traded dialogue with characters who were merely blank air. The hardest challenge for the digital animators at Weta was creating the Grim Reaper
, which went through many transformations before finding physical form. "We set out with the intention of doing the Reaper as a rod puppet
, maybe shooting it in a water tank," Jackson commented. "We even thought of filming someone, dressed in costume, at different camera speeds." Test footage was shot with puppets and a man in a Reaper suit, but in the end, it was decided that using computer animation
would be the easiest task. Another entirely computerized character called "the Gatekeeper", a winged cherub
who helps guard the cemetery, was deleted from the final cut
.
With digital effects work running behind schedule, producer Robert Zemeckis
convinced Wes Takahashi (from George Lucas
' Industrial Light & Magic) to help work on The Frighteners. "The shots Zemeckis showed me were pretty remarkable," Takahashi reflected, "but there were still about 400 shots to do, and everyone was kind of worried." Takahashi was quickly drafted as a visual effects supervisor, and began looking at the schedule, trying to work out whether The Frighteners could be finished in time. "There was no way we'd make the deadline. I figured out a concerted plan involving Jackson and Zemeckis to convince Universal it was worthy of asking for more money." The executives at Universal proposed splitting some of the shots to visual effects companies in the United States, but Jackson, for whom the film was a chance to show New Zealand filmmaking could stand alongside Hollywood, convinced Universal otherwise. Instead, The Frighteners received an accelerated release date, four months earlier than planned, and an additional $6 million in financing, with fifteen digital animators and computer workstations (some were borrowed from Universal and other effects companies in the US). Andrew Adamson
was hired as a digital effects supervisor.
was written and composed by Danny Elfman
. It was released in 1996 on cassette and compact disc
by Universal Records
. The closing credits play "(Don't Fear) The Reaper
", written by Buck Dharma
and performed by New Zealand alternative rock
band The Mutton Birds
. The Mutton Birds version of the song had been previously released as a B-side to their single "She's Been Talking" released in 1996.
Critical reception of the soundtrack was average. Jason Ankeny of album
database Allmusic described the soundtrack as "imaginative" giving it three stars out of five. This was a lower rating on the site then Elfman's other scores of the era, such as Mission: Impossible
, Mars Attacks!
and Flubber. The soundtrack review website Filmtracks referred to the album as "lacking much cohesion or singular creativity".
Track Listing
of The Frighteners, they were impressed enough to move the release date to their "summer blockbuster
slot" on July 19, 1996. In addition, Universal offered the filmmaker the opportunity to make King Kong
, which was not released until 2005. Jackson often disputed over the Motion Picture Association of America
(MPAA) over the film's rating. Aware that he was meant to be delivering Universal a PG-13 rating, Jackson tried his best to omit the amount of graphic violence
as much as possible, but the MPAA still believed The Frighteners deserved an R rating.
, In later interviews taken years after The Frighteners release, Jackson commented he was disappointed by Universal's ubiquitous marketing campaign, including a poster which "didn't tell you anything about the picture", which he believed was the primary reason the film was not a financial success. Additionally, the film opened on the same day the Atlanta Summer Olympics
began; when Jackson realized this and told the studio, they answered "'We don't think so; our research indicates that's not the case...' And I just thought how the hell do they know? There had only ever been three Olympic Games held in the United States in one hundred years!'" Jackson acknowledged The Frighteners tone made it hard to pigeon-hole and sell, and his experience on the film made him understand the importance of marketing.
Kenneth Turan
of the Los Angeles Times
stated "Director Peter Jackson, at home with all kinds of excess in New Zealand, keeps everything spinning nicely, not even losing a step when the mood turns increasingly disturbing." Janet Maslin
from The New York Times
enjoyed The Frighteners, but "walked out the theater with mixed emotions," she commented that "Peter Jackson deserves more enthusiasm for expert, imaginative effects than for his live actors anyhow. These lively touches would leave The Frighteners looking more like a more frantic Beetlejuice
if Jackson's film weren't so wearyingly overcrowded. The Frighteners is not immune to overkill, even though most of its characters are already dead." Jeff Vice of Deseret News praised the acting in the film, with the performances of Fox and Alvarado in particular, but said that there were also "bits that push the taste barrier too far and which grind things to a screeching halt", and that if "Jackson had used the restraint he showed in Heavenly Creatures, the movie could have "been the best of its kind". Critic Christopher Null
praised the film, as he described it as a mixture between Ghostbusters and Twin Peaks
. Michael Drucker of IGN
said that although the film wouldn't make Jackson's top five of movies, it "is a harmless and fun dark comedy that you'll enjoy casually watching from time to time". The Frighteners received mixed reviews from critics from Jackson's native country, New Zealand.
Although reviews were mostly positive, The Frighteners also received negative reviews. Todd McCarthy of Variety
thought that the movie should have remained an episode of Tales from the Crypt. Critic James Berardinelli
believed that although The Frighteners wasn't "a bad film", it was "a disappointment, following Jackson's powerful, true-life matricide tale, Heavenly Creatures
", and because of that "The Frighteners fell short of expectations by being just one of many in the long line of 1996 summer movies." Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
, felt that Jackson was more interested in prosthetic makeup
designs, computer animation
and special effects than writing a cohesive storyline. Ebert and critic Gene Siskel
gave it a "two thumbs down" rating on their TV show At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert
. Chicago Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum
, described the film's special effects as "ugly, aggressive" and "proliferating", saying that "trying to keep interested in [the special effects] was like trying to remain interested in a loudmouth shouting in [his] ear". Edward Guthmann of the San Francisco Chronicle
stated that "instead of moving the horror genre in new directions, The Frighteners simply falls apart from its barrage of visual effects and the overmixed onslaught of Danny Elfman's music score". The Austin Chronicles Joey O'Brien, said that although the screenplay was "practically loaded with wild ideas, knowingly campy dialogue and offbeat characterizations", it "switched gears" too fast and too frequently that "the audience is left struggling to catch up as [The Frighteners] twists and turns its way unmercifully towards a literally out-of-its-words finale".
At the 23rd Saturn Award
s, the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films honored Jackson with nominations for Best Direction
and Best Writing
, the latter he shared with wife Fran Walsh
. The Frighteners also was nominated the Saturn Award for Best Horror Film
, and for its Special Effects
, Make-up
(Rick Baker) and Music
(Danny Elfman
). Michael J. Fox
and Jeffrey Combs
were also nominated for their work.
, Universal Studios Home Entertainment
issued a double-sided director's cut
DVD
of the film in November 2005, which featured a version of The Frighteners that was 14 minutes longer. The other side includes a documentary prepared by Jackson and Wing Nut Films originally for the Laserdisc release. The director's cut was also made available in HD DVD
and Blu-Ray.
Comedy horror
Comedy horror, also known as horror comedy, is a literary and film genre, combining elements of comedy and horror fiction. The comedy horror genre almost always inevitably crosses over with the black comedy genre; and in some respects could be considered a subset of it.The short story "The Legend...
film directed by Peter Jackson
Peter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
and co-written with his wife, Fran Walsh
Fran Walsh
Frances "Fran" Walsh, Lady Jackson, MNZM is a screenwriter, film producer and occasional musician. She is the spouse of filmmaker Peter Jackson. They have two children: Billy and Katie....
. The film's cast includes Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox, OC is a Canadian American actor, author, producer, activist and voice-over artist. With a film and television career spanning from the late 1970s, Fox's roles have included Marty McFly from the Back to the Future trilogy ; Alex P...
, Trini Alvarado
Trini Alvarado
Trinidad "Trini" Alvarado is an American actress best known for her performances as Margaret "Meg" March in the 1994 film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel Little Women and Lucy Lynskey in the comedy/horror film The Frighteners...
, John Astin
John Astin
John Allen Astin is an American actor who has appeared in numerous films and television shows, and is best known for the role of Gomez Addams on The Addams Family, and other similarly eccentric comedic characters.-Early years:...
, Jeffrey Combs
Jeffrey Combs
Jeffrey Alan Combs is an American actor known for his horror film roles and his appearances playing a number of characters in the Star Trek franchise.-Early life:...
, Dee Wallace, Jake Busey
Jake Busey
William Jacob "Jake" Busey is an American actor, musician and film producer. He is sometimes credited as "Jacob Busey" or "William Busey".-Personal life:...
and Chi McBride
Chi McBride
Kenneth "Chi" McBride is an American actor. He starred as Steven Harper on the series Boston Public, as Emerson Cod on Pushing Daisies, and recently appeared in Fox's drama Human Target.-Early life:...
. The Frighteners tells the story of Frank Bannister (Fox), an architect who develops psychic abilities allowing him to see, hear, and communicate with ghosts after his wife's murder. He initially uses his new abilities to work with various spirits to cheat money out of customers for his "ghosthunting" business. However, the spirit of a mass murder
Mass murder
Mass murder is the act of murdering a large number of people , typically at the same time or over a relatively short period of time. According to the FBI, mass murder is defined as four or more murders occurring during a particular event with no cooling-off period between the murders...
er comes back from Hell, able to attack the living and the dead, prompting Frank to investigate the supernatural presence.
Jackson and Walsh conceived the idea for The Frighteners during the scriptwriting phase of Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures is a 1994 film directed by Peter Jackson, from a screenplay he co-wrote with his wife Fran Walsh, about the notorious 1954 Parker-Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Filmed on location in Christchurch, it features Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet in their screen debuts...
. Robert Zemeckis
Robert Zemeckis
Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
hired the duo to write the script, with the original intention of Zemeckis directing The Frighteners as a spin-off
Spin-off (media)
In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
film of the television series, Tales from the Crypt
Tales from the Crypt (TV series)
Tales from the Crypt, sometimes titled HBO's Tales from the Crypt, is an American horror anthology television series that ran from 1989 to 1996 on the premium cable channel HBO...
. With Jackson and Walsh's first draft submitted in January 1994, Zemeckis believed the film would be better off directed by Jackson, produced by Zemeckis and funded/distributed by Universal Pictures
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
. The visual effects were created by Jackson's Weta Digital
Weta Digital
Weta Digital is a digital visual effects company based in Wellington, New Zealand. It was founded by Peter Jackson, Richard Taylor, and Jamie Selkirk in 1993 to produce the digital special effects for Heavenly Creatures. In 2007 Weta Digital’s Senior Visual Effects Supervisor, Joe Letteri, was...
, which had only been in existence for three years. This, plus the fact that The Frighteners required more digital effects shots than almost any movie made up until that time, resulted in the eighteen-month period for effects work by Weta Digital being largely stressed.
Despite a rushed post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
schedule, Universal Pictures was so impressed with Jackson's rough cut
Rough cut
In filmmaking, the rough cut is the second of three stages of offline editing. The rough cut is the first stage in which the film begins to resemble its final product...
on The Frighteners, the studio moved the theatrical release date closer by four months. The film was not a box office
Box office
A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket....
success, but received generally positive reviews from critics. The Frighteners is also Michael J. Fox's last leading role in a live-action feature film; Fox then went on to a four-year run on the television series Spin City
Spin City
Spin City is an American sitcom television series that aired from September 17, 1996 until April 30, 2002 on the ABC network. Created by Gary David Goldberg and Bill Lawrence, the show was based on a fictional local government running New York City, and originally starred Michael J. Fox as Mike...
before semi-retiring in 2000 due to the effects of Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system...
.
Plot
In 1990, architect Frank Bannister loses his wife, Debra, in a car accident. He gives up his profession, letting his unfinished "dream house" sit incomplete for years. Following the accident, Frank gains the power to see ghosts and befriends three: a 1970s gangster named Cyrus, a 1950s nerd named Stuart and a gunslingerGunslinger
Gunfighter, also gunslinger , is a 20th century word, used in cinema or literature, referring to men in the American Old West who had gained a reputation as being dangerous with a gun...
from the Old West called the Judge. Cyrus, Stuart and the Judge haunt houses in the area to accumulate work for Frank's ghostbusting business; Frank then "exorcises" the houses for a fee, even though he is depicted by locals as a con man
Confidence trick
A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. A confidence artist is an individual working alone or in concert with others who exploits characteristics of the human psyche such as dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility,...
. Five years later, Dr. Lucy Lynskey summons Frank, who recently conned her and her husband Ray. Frank discovers that Ray has been killed (just after he left), and an encounter with his ghost leads Frank to discover that an entity resembling the Grim Reaper is killing people and marking numbers on their foreheads that only the psychic can see.
Frank tries helping the people whom the Reaper is targeting because his wife Debra died with a similar number, 13, carved into her forehead. Because Frank can see the numbers ahead of time he can foretell the murders, but this puts him under suspicion with the police and FBI agent Milton Dammers. Highly anal and disturbed from years of undercover work, Dammers is convinced that Frank is responsible for the killings, using some sort of psychic power to stop the hearts of those he subconsciously wishes dead while creating the visage of the Grim Reaper to absolve himself of guilt. Frank is captured and detained after the town's newspaper editor, Madga, who despised Frank's reputation, is killed. While Frank is being detained, Lucy begins to investigate the murders and becomes a target of the Reaper. She is attacked while visiting Frank in jail, but they the manage to escape with the help of Cyrus and Stuart, who are both killed in the process. Frustrated by his inability to fight the Reaper in a mortal body, Frank wants to commit suicide so he can stop the Reaper's killing spree. Instead, Lucy helps Frank have a near death experience by entering hypothermia and using barbiturates to stop his heart. Dammers abducts Lucy, then confesses that he had been a victim of Charles Manson
Charles Manson
Charles Milles Manson is an American criminal who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit the Tate/LaBianca murders carried out by members of the group at his instruction...
and his "Family" in 1969. Frank appears to come to Lucy's aid. In his ghostly form, Frank confronts the Reaper and discovers that the killer is the ghost of Johnny Bartlett (Jake Busey
Jake Busey
William Jacob "Jake" Busey is an American actor, musician and film producer. He is sometimes credited as "Jacob Busey" or "William Busey".-Personal life:...
), a hospital orderly who killed 12 people in a killing spree, where he worked, 32 years ago, then died in the electric chair
Electric chair
Execution by electrocution, usually performed using an electric chair, is an execution method originating in the United States in which the condemned person is strapped to a specially built wooden chair and electrocuted through electrodes placed on the body...
.
Frank reveals Bartlett's true form, but his spirit is forced back into his body by Lucy resuscitating him. After learning the Reaper's identity, Lucy worries that Patricia will become one of Bartlett's targets. She goes to Patricia's house and discovers that Patricia is on friendly terms with Bartlett's ghost, who tells her to kill Lucy. Patricia kills her mother and tries to kill Lucy, but Frank rescues her. Lucy and Frank trap Bartlett's spirit in his urn
Urn
An urn is a vase, ordinarily covered, that usually has a narrowed neck above a footed pedestal. "Knife urns" placed on pedestals flanking a dining-room sideboard were an English innovation for high-style dining rooms of the late 1760s...
, which they find in Patricia's room. Hoping to take the ashes to holy ground, they run for the chapel of the now-abandoned psychiatric hospital to send Bartlett's ghost to Hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
. Frank realizes that this is the hospital where the original crimes were committed, helplessly reliving the events of Bartlett's killing spree in flashback visions, while Patricia, armed with a shotgun, and Dammers chase them through the ruins. Dammers throws the ashes away, releasing Bartlett's ghost again before his head is blown off by Patricia. Bartlett's ghost and Patricia hunt down Frank and Lucy. Frank realizes that Bartlett's ghost drove the two off the road and killed Frank's wife. Patricia used Frank's utility knife
Utility knife
A utility knife is a knife used for general or utility purposes. The utility knife was originally a fixed blade knife with a cutting edge suitable for general work such as cutting hides and cordage, scraping hides, butchering animals, cleaning fish, and other tasks.Today, the term "utility knife"...
to cut the number into her forehead.
Out of bullets, Patricia strangles Frank with the shotgun, then prepares to kill Lucy. Frank's spirit, however, returns and rips Patricia's spirit from her body, dragging her up the Corridor of Life (the passage to Heaven) with him. Bartlett grabs Patricia's ghost, while Frank makes it to Heaven, where he's reunited with Cyrus and Stuart. The three watch as Bartlett and Patricia's spirits are dragged to Hell. After meeting Debra's spirit, Frank learns it is not yet his time and is sent back to his body (Cyrus tells him to start living and Debra asks him to be happy), waking up in Lucy's arms. Frank and Lucy fall in love, and due to her experiences, Lucy can now see ghosts as well. Frank returns to being an architect, demolishing the dream house for his wife that he never finished and building a life with Lucy. As for Dammers, he is a spirit, riding around in the back of Sheriff Walt Perry's car.
Cast
- Michael J. FoxMichael J. FoxMichael J. Fox, OC is a Canadian American actor, author, producer, activist and voice-over artist. With a film and television career spanning from the late 1970s, Fox's roles have included Marty McFly from the Back to the Future trilogy ; Alex P...
as Frank Bannister: Although Jackson and Walsh envisioned The Frighteners as a low budget film with unknown actors, Zemeckis suggested casting his Back to the Future star Michael J. Fox in the lead role. Fox became enthusiastic about working with Jackson when he saw Heavenly CreaturesHeavenly CreaturesHeavenly Creatures is a 1994 film directed by Peter Jackson, from a screenplay he co-wrote with his wife Fran Walsh, about the notorious 1954 Parker-Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Filmed on location in Christchurch, it features Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet in their screen debuts...
at the Toronto International Film FestivalToronto International Film FestivalThe Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...
. Fox read the script and was impressed by its "weirdness and macabre" nature. - Trini AlvaradoTrini AlvaradoTrinidad "Trini" Alvarado is an American actress best known for her performances as Margaret "Meg" March in the 1994 film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel Little Women and Lucy Lynskey in the comedy/horror film The Frighteners...
as Dr. Lucy Lynskey: The character is named after Heavenly Creatures star Melanie LynskeyMelanie LynskeyMelanie Jayne Lynskey is a New Zealand actress best known for playing Charlie Harper's neighbor/stalker Rose on Two and a Half Men, and a range of characters in films such as Win Win, Up in the Air, The Informant!, Away We Go, Flags of Our Fathers, Shattered Glass, Sweet Home Alabama, Ever After...
, who also cameos in The Frighteners. - Peter DobsonPeter DobsonPeter Dobson is an American actor who has appeared in Drowning Mona, The Frighteners, The Poseidon Adventure, and the film adaptation of Last Exit to Brooklyn. He also had a cameo role in Forrest Gump as Elvis Presley. Peter also credits himself under alternate name Derek Hoyle...
as Ray Lynskey: Lucy's health-obsessed and comically hot-headed husband who dislikes Frank's tactics. - John AstinJohn AstinJohn Allen Astin is an American actor who has appeared in numerous films and television shows, and is best known for the role of Gomez Addams on The Addams Family, and other similarly eccentric comedic characters.-Early years:...
as The Judge: Jackson went on to cast John's son Sean AstinSean AstinSean Astin is an American film actor, director, voice artist, and producer better known for his film roles as Mikey Walsh in The Goonies, the title character of Rudy, and Samwise Gamgee in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. In television, he appeared as Lynn McGill in the fifth season of 24...
as Samwise GamgeeSamwise GamgeeSamwise Gamgee, later known as Samwise Gardner and commonly as Sam, is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium. Samwise is one of the chief characters in Tolkien's novel The Lord of the Rings, in which he fills an archetypical role as the sidekick of the protagonist, Frodo...
in The Lord of the RingsThe Lord of the Rings film trilogyThe Lord of the Rings is an epic film trilogy consisting of three fantasy adventure films based on the three-volume book of the same name by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. The films are The Fellowship of the Ring , The Two Towers and The Return of the King .The films were directed by Peter...
. - Jeffrey CombsJeffrey CombsJeffrey Alan Combs is an American actor known for his horror film roles and his appearances playing a number of characters in the Star Trek franchise.-Early life:...
as Special Agent Milton Dammers: Eccentric FBI agent who has a vendetta against Bannister. He is a former undercover agentEspionageEspionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
known for his work with cultCultThe word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
ists, which caused him to sustain multiple massive mutilations and driven to the brink of insanity. Jackson opted to cast Combs as Dammers because he was a fan of the actor's work in Re-AnimatorRe-AnimatorRe-Animator is a 1985 American science fiction horror film based on the H. P. Lovecraft story "Herbert West–Reanimator." Directed by Stuart Gordon, it was the first film in the Re-Animator series. The film has since become a cult film, driven by fans of Jeffrey Combs and H. P...
. - Dee Wallace as Patricia Ann Bradley: Barlett's mentally ill lover who is under strict observance from her elderly mother.
- Jake BuseyJake BuseyWilliam Jacob "Jake" Busey is an American actor, musician and film producer. He is sometimes credited as "Jacob Busey" or "William Busey".-Personal life:...
as Johnny Charles Bartlett: Mass murderer who continues his work in the afterlife, focusing on increasing his body count as a form of competition with other famous murderers. - Chi McBrideChi McBrideKenneth "Chi" McBride is an American actor. He starred as Steven Harper on the series Boston Public, as Emerson Cod on Pushing Daisies, and recently appeared in Fox's drama Human Target.-Early life:...
and Jim FyfeJim Fyfe-Filmography:Movies-Note:...
as Cyrus and Stuart: Frank's deceased associates for his ghosthunting business. - Troy EvansTroy Evans (actor)Troy Evans is an American actor who is perhaps best known for his role as Desk Clerk Francis "Frank" Martin in the television drama series ER. He has also appeared in the movies Tiger Cruise , Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Under Siege, Teen Wolf, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Black Dahlia and The...
as Sheriff Walt Perry: Local law enforcement officer and ally to Frank. - Julianna McCarthyJulianna McCarthyJulianna McCarthy is an American actress. McCarthy was an original cast member of the soap opera The Young and the Restless, starring as matriarch Liz Foster from 1973 to 1982. She reprised the role in 1984, 1985–86, 1993, 2003–2004, and 2008...
as Old Lady Bradley: Patricia's elderly and obsessed mother and former director of the psychiatric hospital. - Elizabeth HawthorneElizabeth HawthorneElizabeth Hawthorne, ONZM, is a New Zealand-born actress who is best known for her role as Mrs. Macready in the 2005 film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and the Peter Jackson supernatural comedy The Frighteners. She played Judge Harriet Caldwell in the 2004 TV...
as Magda Rees-Jones: A snooty British local television news anchor. - Angela BloomfieldAngela Bloomfield-Career:She starred in Shortland Street for nine years, transforming Rachel McKenna from the school girl daughter of clinic boss into a university student, bar manager and later, a Shortland Street clinic employee....
as Debra Bannister: Frank's deceased wife.
Peter Jackson
Peter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
cameos as a man with piercings. Melanie Lynskey
Melanie Lynskey
Melanie Jayne Lynskey is a New Zealand actress best known for playing Charlie Harper's neighbor/stalker Rose on Two and a Half Men, and a range of characters in films such as Win Win, Up in the Air, The Informant!, Away We Go, Flags of Our Fathers, Shattered Glass, Sweet Home Alabama, Ever After...
cameos as a deputy. R. Lee Ermey
R. Lee Ermey
Ronald Lee Ermey is a retired United States Marine Corps drill instructor and actor.Ermey has often played the roles of authority figures, such as his breakout performance as Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket, Mayor Tilman in the Alan Parker film Mississippi Burning, Bill Bowerman in...
cameos as the Ghost of Sgt. Hiles.
Development
Peter JacksonPeter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
and wife/co-writer Fran Walsh
Fran Walsh
Frances "Fran" Walsh, Lady Jackson, MNZM is a screenwriter, film producer and occasional musician. She is the spouse of filmmaker Peter Jackson. They have two children: Billy and Katie....
conceived the idea for The Frighteners in 1992, during the scriptwriting phase of Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures is a 1994 film directed by Peter Jackson, from a screenplay he co-wrote with his wife Fran Walsh, about the notorious 1954 Parker-Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Filmed on location in Christchurch, it features Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet in their screen debuts...
. Together, they wrote a three-page film treatment
Film treatment
A film treatment is a piece of prose, typically the step between scene cards and the first draft of a screenplay for a motion picture, television program, or radio play. It is generally longer and more detailed than an outline , and it may include details of directorial style that an outline omits...
and sent it to their talent agent
Talent agent
A talent agent, or booking agent, is a person who finds jobs for actors, authors, film directors, musicians, models, producers, professional athletes, writers and other people in various entertainment businesses. Having an agent is not required, but does help the artist in getting jobs...
in Hollywood. Robert Zemeckis
Robert Zemeckis
Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
viewed their treatment with the intention of directing The Frighteners as a spin-off
Spin-off (media)
In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
film of the television series, Tales from the Crypt
Tales from the Crypt (TV series)
Tales from the Crypt, sometimes titled HBO's Tales from the Crypt, is an American horror anthology television series that ran from 1989 to 1996 on the premium cable channel HBO...
(which he helped produce). Zemeckis hired Jackson and Walsh to turn their treatment into a full-length screenplay in January 1993. The husband and wife duo completed their first draft for The Frighteners in early-January 1994. Zemeckis was so impressed with their script, he decided The Frighteners would work better directed by Jackson, executive produced by Zemeckis and funded/distributed by Universal Pictures
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
. Universal greenlight
Greenlight
To green-light a project is to give permission or a go ahead to move forward with a project. In the context of the movie and TV businesses, to green-light something is to formally approve its production finance, thereby allowing the project to move forward from the development phase to...
ed the film to commence pre-production
Pre-production
Pre-production or In Production is the process of preparing all the elements involved in a film, play, or other performance.- In film :...
on a $26 million budget in April 1994. The studio also granted Jackson and Zemeckis total artistic control
Artistic control
Artistic control or Creative Control is a term commonly used in media production, such as movies, television, and music production. A person with artistic control has the authority to decide how the final product will appear. In movies, this commonly refers to the authority to decide on the final...
and the right of final cut privilege
Final cut privilege
Final cut privilege is a film industry term, usually used when a director has contractual authority over how a film is ultimately released for public viewing.- Condition :...
.
Production
The decision to film The Frighteners entirely in New Zealand was Jackson's idea. Zemeckis and Universal agreed on the condition that Jackson made New Zealand look similar to the Midwestern United StatesMidwestern United States
The Midwestern United States is one of the four U.S. geographic regions defined by the United States Census Bureau, providing an official definition of the American Midwest....
. Principal photography
Principal photography
thumb|300px|Film production on location in [[Newark, New Jersey]].Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling, as distinct from pre-production and post-production....
began on May 14, 1995 and lasted until November 16, which is one of the longest shooting schedule
Shooting schedule
A shooting schedule is a project plan of each day's shooting for a film production. It is normally created and managed by the assistant director, who reports to the production manager managing the production schedule...
s Universal Pictures ever approved of. Six weeks into the shoot, cinematographer
Cinematographer
A cinematographer is one photographing with a motion picture camera . The title is generally equivalent to director of photography , used to designate a chief over the camera and lighting crews working on a film, responsible for achieving artistic and technical decisions related to the image...
Alun Bollinger
Alun Bollinger
Alun Bollinger, MNZM is a New Zealand cinematographer, who has worked on several Peter Jackson films, and many other films in New Zealand. He has also been a Director of Photography, including the second unit for Peter Jackson's trilogy The Lord of the Rings...
had a serious car accident. His replacement, John Blick, later alternated duties with Bollinger for much of the rest of the shoot. Location shooting
Location shooting
Location shooting is the practice of filming in an actual setting rather than on a sound stage or back lot. In filmmaking a location is any place where a film crew will be filming actors and recording their dialog. A location where dialog is not recorded may be considered as a second unit...
primarily included Wellington
Wellington
Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...
and three weeks spent in Lyttelton
Lyttelton, New Zealand
Lyttelton is a port town on the north shore of Lyttelton Harbour close to Banks Peninsula, a suburb of Christchurch on the eastern coast of the South Island of New Zealand....
. Interior scenes were compiled at Camperdown Studios in Miramar
Miramar, New Zealand
Miramar is a suburb of Wellington, New Zealand, south-east of the city centre. It is on the Miramar Peninsula, directly east of the isthmus of Rongotai, the site of Wellington International Airport.-History:...
.
Visual effects
Jackson's Weta DigitalWeta Digital
Weta Digital is a digital visual effects company based in Wellington, New Zealand. It was founded by Peter Jackson, Richard Taylor, and Jamie Selkirk in 1993 to produce the digital special effects for Heavenly Creatures. In 2007 Weta Digital’s Senior Visual Effects Supervisor, Joe Letteri, was...
created the visual effects, which included computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
, as well as scale model
Scale model
A scale model is a physical model, a representation or copy of an object that is larger or smaller than the actual size of the object, which seeks to maintain the relative proportions of the physical size of the original object. Very often the scale model is used as a guide to making the object in...
s (which were necessary to make Wellington
Wellington
Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...
look American), prosthetic makeup
Prosthetic makeup
Prosthetic makeup is the process of using prosthetic sculpting, molding and casting techniques to create advanced cosmetic effects...
and practical effects with help from Weta Workshop
Weta Workshop
Weta Workshop is a special effects and prop company based in Miramar, New Zealand, producing effects for television and film.Founded in 1987 by Richard Taylor and Tania Rodger as RT Effects, Weta Workshop has produced creatures and makeup effects for the TV series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys...
. Visual effects supervisor
Visual effects supervisor
In the context of film and television production, a visual effects supervisor is responsible for achieving the creative aims of the director and/or producers through the use of visual effects...
Richard Taylor explained that effects work on The Frighteners was complex due to Weta's inexperience with computer technology in the mid-1990s. Prior to this film, Weta worked largely with physical effects
Physical effects
Physical effects is a sub-category of special effects in which mechanical or physical effects are recorded. Physical effects are usually planned in preproduction and created in production.Physical effects may be divided into at least four categories:...
. With so many ghosts among its main cast, The Frighteners required more digital effects shots than almost any movie made up till that time. For a special effects company that had been in existence less than three years, the eighteen-month period for completing The Frighteners was largely stressful. Some shots were handled by a small New Zealand company called Pixel Perfect, many of whose employees would eventually join Weta Digital. Rick Baker was hired to design the prosthetic makeup for The Judge, portrayed by John Astin
John Astin
John Allen Astin is an American actor who has appeared in numerous films and television shows, and is best known for the role of Gomez Addams on The Addams Family, and other similarly eccentric comedic characters.-Early years:...
(the detachable jawbone was later added digitally). However, Baker was not able to apply Astin's five hours of makeup himself due to his commitment on The Nutty Professor
The Nutty Professor (1996 film)
The Nutty Professor is a 1996 science fiction-romantic comedy film starring Eddie Murphy. It is a remake of the 1963 film of the same name, starring Jerry Lewis. The original music score was composed by David Newman. The film won an Academy Award for Makeup.Murphy plays benevolent university...
. Makeup artist Brian Penikas (Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) fulfilled Baker's duties.
The extended shooting schedule for The Frighteners owed much to the fact that scenes where ghosts and human characters interacted had to be filmed twice; once with human characters acting on set, and then with the ghost characters acting against a blue screen
Chroma key
Chroma key compositing is a technique for compositing two images together. A color range in the top layer is made transparent, revealing another image behind. The chroma keying technique is commonly used in video production and post-production...
. The two elements would later be digitally composited into one shot with the use of split screen photography. Such sequences required precise timing from the cast as they traded dialogue with characters who were merely blank air. The hardest challenge for the digital animators at Weta was creating the Grim Reaper
Death (personification)
The concept of death as a sentient entity has existed in many societies since the beginning of history. In English, Death is often given the name Grim Reaper and, from the 15th century onwards, came to be shown as a skeletal figure carrying a large scythe and clothed in a black cloak with a hood...
, which went through many transformations before finding physical form. "We set out with the intention of doing the Reaper as a rod puppet
Puppet
A puppet is an inanimate object or representational figure animated or manipulated by an entertainer, who is called a puppeteer. It is used in puppetry, a play or a presentation that is a very ancient form of theatre....
, maybe shooting it in a water tank," Jackson commented. "We even thought of filming someone, dressed in costume, at different camera speeds." Test footage was shot with puppets and a man in a Reaper suit, but in the end, it was decided that using computer animation
Computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
would be the easiest task. Another entirely computerized character called "the Gatekeeper", a winged cherub
Cherub
A cherub is a type of spiritual being mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and cited later on in the Christian biblical canons, usually associated with the presence of God...
who helps guard the cemetery, was deleted from the final cut
Final cut privilege
Final cut privilege is a film industry term, usually used when a director has contractual authority over how a film is ultimately released for public viewing.- Condition :...
.
With digital effects work running behind schedule, producer Robert Zemeckis
Robert Zemeckis
Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
convinced Wes Takahashi (from George Lucas
George Lucas
George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
' Industrial Light & Magic) to help work on The Frighteners. "The shots Zemeckis showed me were pretty remarkable," Takahashi reflected, "but there were still about 400 shots to do, and everyone was kind of worried." Takahashi was quickly drafted as a visual effects supervisor, and began looking at the schedule, trying to work out whether The Frighteners could be finished in time. "There was no way we'd make the deadline. I figured out a concerted plan involving Jackson and Zemeckis to convince Universal it was worthy of asking for more money." The executives at Universal proposed splitting some of the shots to visual effects companies in the United States, but Jackson, for whom the film was a chance to show New Zealand filmmaking could stand alongside Hollywood, convinced Universal otherwise. Instead, The Frighteners received an accelerated release date, four months earlier than planned, and an additional $6 million in financing, with fifteen digital animators and computer workstations (some were borrowed from Universal and other effects companies in the US). Andrew Adamson
Andrew Adamson
Andrew Ralph Adamson, MNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer and screenwriter based mainly in Los Angeles, where he made the blockbuster animation films, Shrek and Shrek 2 for which he received an Academy Award nomination. He was director, executive producer, and scriptwriter for C. S....
was hired as a digital effects supervisor.
Soundtrack
The film scoreFilm score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
was written and composed by Danny Elfman
Danny Elfman
Daniel Robert "Danny" Elfman is an American composer, best known for scoring music for television and film. Up until 1995, he was the lead singer and songwriter in the rock band Oingo Boingo, a group he formed in 1976...
. It was released in 1996 on cassette and compact disc
Compact Disc
The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
by Universal Records
Universal Records
Universal Records was a record label owned by Universal Music Group, and it is now owned by Manny Patino and Michael Jackson, and operated as part of the Universal Motown Republic Group.-History:...
. The closing credits play "(Don't Fear) The Reaper
(Don't Fear) The Reaper
" The Reaper" is a song by the rock band Blue Öyster Cult from their 1976 album, Agents of Fortune. It was written and sung by the band's lead guitarist, Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser and was produced by David Lucas, Murray Krugman, and Sandy Pearlman. It is built around Dharma's guitar riff that...
", written by Buck Dharma
Buck Dharma
Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser is an American guitarist and songwriter, best known for being a member of Blue Öyster Cult since the group's formation in 1967...
and performed by New Zealand alternative rock
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
band The Mutton Birds
The Mutton Birds
The Mutton Birds was a band from New Zealand formed in 1991 by Don McGlashan, Ross Burge, and David Long.-History:All three members came into the band with experience: McGlashan came from Blam Blam Blam and The Front Lawn, guitarist Long had played in the Six Volts and Burge had played in the...
. The Mutton Birds version of the song had been previously released as a B-side to their single "She's Been Talking" released in 1996.
Critical reception of the soundtrack was average. Jason Ankeny of album
Album
An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...
database Allmusic described the soundtrack as "imaginative" giving it three stars out of five. This was a lower rating on the site then Elfman's other scores of the era, such as Mission: Impossible
Mission: Impossible (film)
Mission: Impossible is a 1996 action thriller directed by Brian De Palma and starring Tom Cruise. Following on from the television series of the same name, the plot follows a new agent, Ethan Hunt and his mission to uncover the mole within the CIA who has framed him for the murders of his entire...
, Mars Attacks!
Mars Attacks!
Mars Attacks! is a 1996 American science fiction film directed by Tim Burton and based on the cult trading card series of the same name. The film uses elements of black comedy, surreal humour, and political satire, and claims to be also a parody of multiple science fiction B movies...
and Flubber. The soundtrack review website Filmtracks referred to the album as "lacking much cohesion or singular creativity".
Track Listing
Release
The original release date was October 31, 1996, but after Universal studio executives viewed a rough cutRough cut
In filmmaking, the rough cut is the second of three stages of offline editing. The rough cut is the first stage in which the film begins to resemble its final product...
of The Frighteners, they were impressed enough to move the release date to their "summer blockbuster
Blockbuster (entertainment)
Blockbuster, as applied to film or theatre, denotes a very popular or successful production. The entertainment industry use was originally theatrical slang referring to a particularly successful play but is now used primarily by the film industry...
slot" on July 19, 1996. In addition, Universal offered the filmmaker the opportunity to make King Kong
King Kong (2005 film)
King Kong is a 2005 fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson. It is a remake of the 1933 film of the same name and stars Naomi Watts, Jack Black and Adrien Brody. Andy Serkis, through performance capture, portrays Kong....
, which was not released until 2005. Jackson often disputed over the Motion Picture Association of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
(MPAA) over the film's rating. Aware that he was meant to be delivering Universal a PG-13 rating, Jackson tried his best to omit the amount of graphic violence
Graphic violence
Graphic violence is the depiction of especially vivid, brutal and realistic acts of violence in visual media such as literature, film, television, and video games...
as much as possible, but the MPAA still believed The Frighteners deserved an R rating.
Box office
The Frighteners was released in the United States in 1,675 theaters, earning $5,565,495 during its opening weekend. The film eventually grossed $16,759,216 in the United States and $12,600,000 internationally, coming to a worldwide total of $29,359,216. The Frighteners was not a financial success, mostly due to competition from Independence DayIndependence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
, In later interviews taken years after The Frighteners release, Jackson commented he was disappointed by Universal's ubiquitous marketing campaign, including a poster which "didn't tell you anything about the picture", which he believed was the primary reason the film was not a financial success. Additionally, the film opened on the same day the Atlanta Summer Olympics
1996 Summer Olympics
The 1996 Summer Olympics of Atlanta, officially known as the Games of the XXVI Olympiad and unofficially known as the Centennial Olympics, was an international multi-sport event which was celebrated in 1996 in Atlanta, Georgia, United States....
began; when Jackson realized this and told the studio, they answered "'We don't think so; our research indicates that's not the case...' And I just thought how the hell do they know? There had only ever been three Olympic Games held in the United States in one hundred years!'" Jackson acknowledged The Frighteners tone made it hard to pigeon-hole and sell, and his experience on the film made him understand the importance of marketing.
Critical reception
Kenneth Turan
Kenneth Turan is an American film critic and Lecturer in the Master of Professional Writing Program at the University of Southern California.-Background:...
of the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
stated "Director Peter Jackson, at home with all kinds of excess in New Zealand, keeps everything spinning nicely, not even losing a step when the mood turns increasingly disturbing." Janet Maslin
Janet Maslin
Janet Maslin is an American journalist, best known as a film and literary critic for The New York Times. She served as the Times film critic from 1977–1999.- Biography :...
from The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
enjoyed The Frighteners, but "walked out the theater with mixed emotions," she commented that "Peter Jackson deserves more enthusiasm for expert, imaginative effects than for his live actors anyhow. These lively touches would leave The Frighteners looking more like a more frantic Beetlejuice
Beetlejuice
Beetlejuice is a 1988 American comedy horror film directed by Tim Burton, produced by The Geffen Film Company and distributed by Warner Bros...
if Jackson's film weren't so wearyingly overcrowded. The Frighteners is not immune to overkill, even though most of its characters are already dead." Jeff Vice of Deseret News praised the acting in the film, with the performances of Fox and Alvarado in particular, but said that there were also "bits that push the taste barrier too far and which grind things to a screeching halt", and that if "Jackson had used the restraint he showed in Heavenly Creatures, the movie could have "been the best of its kind". Critic Christopher Null
Christopher Null
Christopher Null is a film critic, columnist and former blogger for Yahoo! Tech, editor of Drinkhacker.com, and is the founder and editor in chief of Filmcritic.com.-Publications:...
praised the film, as he described it as a mixture between Ghostbusters and Twin Peaks
Twin Peaks
Twin Peaks is an American television serial drama created by David Lynch and Mark Frost. The series follows the investigation headed by FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper , of the murder of a popular teenager and homecoming queen, Laura Palmer...
. Michael Drucker of IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
said that although the film wouldn't make Jackson's top five of movies, it "is a harmless and fun dark comedy that you'll enjoy casually watching from time to time". The Frighteners received mixed reviews from critics from Jackson's native country, New Zealand.
Although reviews were mostly positive, The Frighteners also received negative reviews. Todd McCarthy of Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
thought that the movie should have remained an episode of Tales from the Crypt. Critic James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli is an American online film critic.-Personal life:Berardinelli was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey and spent his early childhood in Morristown, New Jersey. At the age of nine years, he relocated to the township of Cherry Hill, New Jersey...
believed that although The Frighteners wasn't "a bad film", it was "a disappointment, following Jackson's powerful, true-life matricide tale, Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures
Heavenly Creatures is a 1994 film directed by Peter Jackson, from a screenplay he co-wrote with his wife Fran Walsh, about the notorious 1954 Parker-Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Filmed on location in Christchurch, it features Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet in their screen debuts...
", and because of that "The Frighteners fell short of expectations by being just one of many in the long line of 1996 summer movies." Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the flagship paper of the Sun-Times Media Group.-History:The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city...
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
, felt that Jackson was more interested in prosthetic makeup
Prosthetic makeup
Prosthetic makeup is the process of using prosthetic sculpting, molding and casting techniques to create advanced cosmetic effects...
designs, computer animation
Computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
and special effects than writing a cohesive storyline. Ebert and critic Gene Siskel
Gene Siskel
Eugene Kal "Gene" Siskel was an American film critic and journalist for the Chicago Tribune. Along with colleague Roger Ebert, he hosted the popular review show Siskel & Ebert At the Movies from 1975 until his death....
gave it a "two thumbs down" rating on their TV show At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert
At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert
At the Movies was a movie review television program that aired from 1982 to 1990. It was produced by Tribune Entertainment and created by Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, who had left Sneak Previews the previous year....
. Chicago Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum is an American film critic. Rosenbaum was the head film critic for the Chicago Reader from 1987 until 2008, when he retired at the age of 65...
, described the film's special effects as "ugly, aggressive" and "proliferating", saying that "trying to keep interested in [the special effects] was like trying to remain interested in a loudmouth shouting in [his] ear". Edward Guthmann of the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
stated that "instead of moving the horror genre in new directions, The Frighteners simply falls apart from its barrage of visual effects and the overmixed onslaught of Danny Elfman's music score". The Austin Chronicles Joey O'Brien, said that although the screenplay was "practically loaded with wild ideas, knowingly campy dialogue and offbeat characterizations", it "switched gears" too fast and too frequently that "the audience is left struggling to catch up as [The Frighteners] twists and turns its way unmercifully towards a literally out-of-its-words finale".
At the 23rd Saturn Award
Saturn Award
The Saturn Award is an award presented annually by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films to honor the top works in science fiction, fantasy, and horror in film, television, and home video. The Saturn Awards were devised by Dr. Donald A. Reed in 1972, who felt that films within...
s, the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films honored Jackson with nominations for Best Direction
Saturn Award for Best Direction
The following is a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Direction:-Multiple Winners:*James Cameron - 5 awards*Steven Spielberg - 4 awards*Peter Jackson - 3 awards*Bryan Singer - 2 awards...
and Best Writing
Saturn Award for Best Writing
The following is a list of people who have won the Saturn Award for Best Writing.-Multiple Winners:*James Cameron - 3 awards*Christopher Nolan - 3 awards*William Peter Blatty - 3 awards-External links:* http://www.saturnawards.org/past.html#writing...
, the latter he shared with wife Fran Walsh
Fran Walsh
Frances "Fran" Walsh, Lady Jackson, MNZM is a screenwriter, film producer and occasional musician. She is the spouse of filmmaker Peter Jackson. They have two children: Billy and Katie....
. The Frighteners also was nominated the Saturn Award for Best Horror Film
Saturn Award for Best Horror Film
The following are a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Horror Film:-References:...
, and for its Special Effects
Saturn Award for Best Special Effects
The following are a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Special Effects:...
, Make-up
Saturn Award for Best Make-up
The following is a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Make-up:...
(Rick Baker) and Music
Saturn Award for Best Make-up
The following is a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Make-up:...
(Danny Elfman
Danny Elfman
Daniel Robert "Danny" Elfman is an American composer, best known for scoring music for television and film. Up until 1995, he was the lead singer and songwriter in the rock band Oingo Boingo, a group he formed in 1976...
). Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox, OC is a Canadian American actor, author, producer, activist and voice-over artist. With a film and television career spanning from the late 1970s, Fox's roles have included Marty McFly from the Back to the Future trilogy ; Alex P...
and Jeffrey Combs
Jeffrey Combs
Jeffrey Alan Combs is an American actor known for his horror film roles and his appearances playing a number of characters in the Star Trek franchise.-Early life:...
were also nominated for their work.
Home media
The Frighteners was first released on DVD in August 1998, but included no special features. To coincide with the release of Jackson's King KongKing Kong (2005 film)
King Kong is a 2005 fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson. It is a remake of the 1933 film of the same name and stars Naomi Watts, Jack Black and Adrien Brody. Andy Serkis, through performance capture, portrays Kong....
, Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Universal Studios Home Entertainment is the home video division of Universal Pictures...
issued a double-sided director's cut
Director's cut
A director's cut is a specially edited version of a film, and less often TV series, music video, commercials, comic book or video games, that is supposed to represent the director's own approved edit...
DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
of the film in November 2005, which featured a version of The Frighteners that was 14 minutes longer. The other side includes a documentary prepared by Jackson and Wing Nut Films originally for the Laserdisc release. The director's cut was also made available in HD DVD
HD DVD
HD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...
and Blu-Ray.