The Frighteners

Director: Peter Jackson (New Zealand, 1996). Year of Release: 1996

A large house in the middle of a storm. Thunder crashes and insistent Danny Elfman music plays. Inside the house, a woman screams. We see her running in a night dress down some ancient stairs. As she tries to hide, the walls literally break out and try to grab her. Pieces of furniture crash to the ground. The woman attempts to escape upstairs, pursued by an uncoiling roll of carpet. A cloaked figure drags her from behind. She is only saved by a woman with white hair letting off a shotgun.

It is a while before we see either of these women again, Instead we follow a funeral cortège to the cemetery. A journalist is writing an article headed “Death Strikes Again”. Another man in town has died of a mystery heart condition. This is not the first time that death has hit the coastal town of Fairwater, scene of a murder spree in 1964, 30 years earlier. Once more, apparently healthy residents are dropping down dead, possible victims of a heart condition.

Is this getting too heavy for you? Don’t worry, because it’s about to take a silly turn. The funeral is crashed by Michael J Fox, handing out business cards as Frank Bannister, Psychic Investigator. He is physically ejected. We will soon see Frank erratically driving his car down what may be the town’s only road. As he swerves to avoid an oncoming truck, he smashes through the white picket fence of pretty but dumb Ray Lynskey, running over Ray’s garden gnome.

Meanwhile, a woman is visiting the house from the opening scene. Lucy is new in town, and is carrying out the normal doctor’s house calls while he is at the funeral. She notices that the younger woman, Patricia, is nervous and has a nasty looking weal on her neck. Patricia’s mother is keen to get rid of Lucy. Later, while watching Real Life Murder videos, Lucy identifies 15-year old Patricia, who was besotted with Johnny Bartlett, responsible for the 1964 murders.

Lucy goes home to her husband – who turns out to be dimwitted Ray. At night, their house is hit by a poltergeist attack, which lifts Lucy’s bed – and Lucy in it – to the ceiling. Ray finds Frank Bannister’s card, which he thought he had thrown away, and reluctantly calls him in for some spirit clearance. Frank agrees, saying it will cost them. We soon learn that the moving furniture and crockery was instigated by spirits Stuart, Cyrus and the Judge, who only Frank can see.

For a film which is gleefully proud of its own silliness, and is happy to peddle any old nonsense, The Frighteners sure has a load of plot. Most of what we see does not make any sense, or at least it adheres to a logic that only works if we accept it hook line and sinker. Nonetheless, as the above description of the first quarter hour shows, all sorts of Stuff happens. The film contains any number of characters, each of whom has a finely described personality.

Above all, there are a lot of villains. If this were a Whodunnit?, we could spend ages working out who was evil enough to be carrying out the current murder spree. As it happens, the film is more interested in telling jokes than creating any great suspense, but it does leave you wondering just how much of a baddie many of the characters are. We’re fairly sure that Frank is a goodie, even though he’s clearly a con man. It is difficult to imagine Michael J Fox being unlikeable.

But what about the inhabitants of the mansion on the hill? Patricia’s mother is clearly a demon (isn’t she?), not letting her daughter have any contact with the outside world. But what about Patricia herself? She did have a teenage obsession with a serial killer, even doing time for her complicity in the murders. Having said this, Patricia was eventually released. Lucy sees it as her mission to free Patricia from her domineering mother, but is she as innocent as she seems?

The creepy Ray is killed off early on, so we don’t need to worry about him. But what about FBI agent Milton Dammers, who has been seconded to the murder case. With a Hitler haircut and Doctor Strangelove leather gloves, Dammers is creepy, even before we see the swastika tattoo on his palm. Apparently he spent several year working undercover in Manson Family-type groups, which may have tipped him over the edge and affected his mental health.

Then there is the Big One – the Grim Reaper himself. The GR, or someone like him, is travelling round town and carving a number on people’s foreheads, representing which number victim they will be. He then puts his hand on their heart, and they day of a “heart attack” despite surgeons being unable to find any cause of death. As the Reaper is paranormal, only Frank and his spirit friends can see him, or are able to intervene and stop his attacks.

The Frighteners could very easily have been very bad. One main reason that it isn’t is the phenomenal performance of Michael J Fox, who I can never remember being anything less than likeable. Fox, like the other actors and writers, never takes himself too seriously, preferring to revel in the general ridiculousness of it all. At the same time, while the film is deliciously dumb, it balances a load of different plots and characters who are believable, sympathetic and fun to watch.

And it does manage, or at least it tries, to respect gender equality. The women are even allowed some scenes of their own. As a romance develops between Ray and Lucy, there is a point when he is injured so badly that she has to take over the fight. Something similar happens on the side of the baddies (I’m not saying any more here to avoid plot spoilers). Of course in the end the men return to assert their authority, but at least they tried.

The Frighteners was made in an interesting time. Director Peter Jackson was revelling in the success of his breakthrough film Heavenly Creatures, and is obviously enjoying the opportunity to try out alternative ideas on a slightly bigger budget (this is before he fell into the Lord of the Rings / Hobbit hell where character and plot no longer matter). And although many of Michael J Fox’s best films were behind him, he still shows immaculate comic timing.

It is easy not to like The Frighteners (and Roger Ebert hated it). But if you just lighten up a bit, it’s well worth your time. I think it’s a sign of how underrated a film it is that until today I’d never heard of it. This is far less than it deserves.