| 80 |
LA Weekly
Paul Malcolm
It's cheap thrills all the way, served up with the kind of situational purity that only Carpenter seems to care for these days. It's that simple and that much fun.
|
| 80 |
New Times (L.A.)
Gregory Weinkauf
Rife with silliness, such as the flashbacks within flashbacks of characters who were not with one another at the time, and occasional unintentional laughs -- but it's also a good, raucous kick in the behind, which is literally all it aspires to be
|
| 75 |
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
A brawny space opera, transplanting the conventions of Western, cop and martial arts films to the Red Planet.
|
| 63 |
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
Carpenter writes his own scripts -- here with past collaborator Larry Sulkis -- and their "Ghosts" screenplay lacks the density, character and humor of a Hollywood genre classic.
|
| 60 |
Salon.com
Andrew O'Hehir
It might be nice if Ghosts of Mars had more to offer than snappy repartee and shameless gore, or if it could borrow a little narrative tension from its Alien Chain Saw forebears.
|
| 50 |
Washington Post
Michael O'Sullivan
For those so inclined, it's nice to see the girl and the gangsta -- not the gunslinger -- save the day.
|
| 42 |
Entertainment Weekly
Bruce Fretts
Borderline-incoherent.
|
| 42 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
A redundancy, and a bore. The characters are harrowingly unsympathetic, the action sequences are by-the-numbers, and Carpenter's usual saving grace -- his sense of humor -- is nowhere in evidence.
|
| 40 |
Los Angeles Times
Kevin Thomas
Carpenter's heart doesn't seem to be in this lackluster space adventure set in 2176. What's more, his stars -- Natasha Henstridge and Ice Cube -- don't exactly energize the proceedings.
|
| 40 |
Village Voice
Michael Atkinson
Written, directed, and edited with the offhand shoddiness of a day worker thinking about his evening beer.
|
| 40 |
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
Bad enough that the plot is shopworn, but the tough-gal talk is unintentionally hilarious, and the complicated narrative structure is annoying and pointless.
|
| 38 |
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
It starts as enjoyable B-movie pulp, degenerates to camp, then turns into laughable lunacy.
|
| 38 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
While this cheesy, heavy-metal melange of horror, space hooey and cowboy shoot-'em-ups isn't exactly dull, it isn't anything to write home about either.
|
| 30 |
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
Like a zombie picture directed by one of the undead.
|
| 30 |
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
A turgid recycling of Mr. Carpenter's remake of "The Thing."
|
| 25 |
New York Post
Jonathan Foreman
A deep disappointment to fans of sci-fi and the once great John Carpenter.
|
| 25 |
Boston Globe
Jay Carr
Slides instantly into the realm of the forgettable.
|
| 25 |
Portland Oregonian
Barry Johnson
It's not confusing, it's just slow. Very slow. Glacial.
|
| 25 |
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
I have an idea for a Mars movie. When our first astronauts step onto the Red Planet, they discover that Martians not only exist but that they've hired Johnnie Cochran to represent them in a massive defamation suit against American filmmakers.
|
| 25 |
San Francisco Chronicle
Bob Graham
A tired and dispiriting affair that takes forever to get going.
|
| 25 |
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
A horror/sci-fi/action mishmash that aims to be the kind of brainless timekiller once used to round out the bottom of a double bill at the drive-in.
|
| 25 |
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
Carpenter pulls out all the action-adventure stops, but he and coscripter Larry Sulkis forgot to write dialogue the audience could listen to without howling in disbelief.
|
| 20 |
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
It keeps you off balance, all right, but not enough to obscure the sad fact that Ghosts of Mars is a muddled, derivative disaster straight on through.
|
| 20 |
Washington Post
Rita Kempley
Schlocky, sluggish shoot-'em-up.
|
| 20 |
Mr. Showbiz
Cody Clark
So wretched that it practically defies description.
|
| 20 |
Variety
Robert Koehler
This deliberately pre-'90s slice of rock 'n' roll-tinged sci-fi horror, decorated with anything but the latest in special effects, seems particularly grungy and marginal.
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