Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3215 in DVD
• Released on: 2006-09-05
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Dubbed, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Dutch, English, Hindi, Italian
• Dubbed in: Italian
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 87 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
A by-the-numbers haunted house movie, albeit one with some neat twists, a couple of good performances and impressive design work, Thirteen Ghosts is a remake of the 1960 original by exploitation superstar William Castle. When ghost-hunter Cyrus (F Murray Abraham) dies his quietly decent widower nephew Arthur (Tony Shaloub) inherits his house. With almost infinite predictability, he, his teenage daughter (Shannon Elizabeth) and young son, as well as a rival ghost-hunter and Cyrus' untrustworthy tame psychic (Mathew Lillard), are trapped in the house, which is a glass labyrinth of sliding panels and shifting staircases. As the woman ghost-hunter Kalina helpfully explains, the house is "a machine designed by the devil and powered by the dead"--specifically by 12 ghosts, most of them murderously malevolent.

Shaloub and Lillard manage to make us care about this farrago and Abraham lends his few scenes his usual malignant authority, but the real star is the inventively designed house itself and the outrageous horror-comic makeup of the ghosts. This is a knowingly trashy film enjoyable on its own level.

On the DVD: Thirteen Ghosts comes with a short textual explanation of who Castle was and why he should get this sort of homage, a self-congratulatory making-of documentary and filmographies for cast and crew, as well as odd short featurettes explaining the imagined back-story for each of the ghosts. The disc has Dolby sound and is presented in a 1.85:1 widescreen ratio.--Roz Kaveney

Video Description
DVD Special Features
Director’s Commentary
12 Featurettes
"The Making Of" Featurette
Filmographies
Trailer
Languages: English, Italian
Subtitles: Dutch, English, English (for hard of hearing), Hindi, Italian

Synopsis
THIRTEEN GHOSTS, Steve Beck's feature debut, is the second recent remake (following THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL) of a film by 1950s and 60s camp horror king, William Castle. Arthur Kriticos (Tony Shalhoub) is a financially strapped widower struggling to raise two children, Kathy (Shannon Elizabeth) and Bobby (Alec Roberts), after losing his wife in a house fire. A stroke of apparent luck arrives when Arthur learns he has inherited a mansion from his mysterious Uncle Cyrus (F. Murray Abraham). Ecstatic, Arthur whisks the kids and nanny, Maggie (Rah Digga) off to their new home, a bizarre glass and steel structure with strange Latin inscriptions carved on the walls. The family is thrilled, until a psychic and former employee of Cyrus', Rafkin (Matthew Lillard), reveals that Arthur's departed uncle was a power hungry ghost collector who captured twelve spirits in the house. Arthur is skeptical. But when his children disappear, and Rafkin gives him a pair of special glasses that allow him to view the house's gruesome inhabitants, he believes. In Beck's special effects-laden gore-fest, the two men race against time to find the children as the house's strange internal mechanism begins sealing off the exits and freeing the angry ghosts.

Customer Reviews

Thirteen Ghosts = Thirteen Sleepless Nights
Thirteen Ghosts is a remake of a 1960's film of the same title created by the brilliant William Castle. The film follows a man and his children who become trapped in a ghost ridden house that they've inherited from Cyrus (the man's eccentric uncle.) Trapped along with them are a psychic, a lawyer, and a ghost hunter.

Thirteen Ghosts is a bit different from your standard horror, and it goes without saying that I doubt that this it's the kind of film that everyone will find scary. But for me at least it worked. As this is probably one of the greatest ghost films I've ever seen. The bathroom scene especially, which has been done really well comes to mind. Not to mention when the lawyer 'splits.' The plot is solid and progresses well, keeping you both scared and wanting to watch more at the same time. The film is full of suspense and tension and there are more than a few very good twists throughout. The ghosts themselves are nothing less than awesome. It's obvious that a lot of time and thought has been put in their creation. A few people have mentioned how we're not really giving a back story to the ghosts in the film itself. But there is a fantastic special feature on the DVD which goes into all the depth and detail you could possibly want. It would have been nice if the information was included in the film, but I doubt that the sheer amount of story surrounding the ghosts could have been successfully integrated. The house itself is brilliant in design. Labyrinth like and packed with sliding glass doors, shifting walls and endless passages, it really looks fantastic. The special effects are perfect and really enhance the film. I'm glad that they were not over the top. Thanks to the realism of the ghosts themselves, as well as the brilliant acting (by most) and script, I actually found Thirteen Ghosts very scary, and gory. I know that there are a lot of people who didn't like Thirteen Ghosts. I honestly can't imagine why. But remakes in general tend to be difficult because people will often compare them to the original.

But the only thing I can really fault is I thought that the ending was rather weak. It was a good enough ending, but I can't help think that it could have been done better. However Thirteen Ghosts is a seriously brilliant horror, and a film that I really enjoyed. If any film deserves five stars it's this one. It is up there with Poltergeist and The Sixth Sense which is saying something. So it's well worth a watch. Maybe I was being a bit unrealistic when I said that Thirteen Ghosts equals thirteen sleepless nights, but nevertheless this film is pretty much guaranteed to give you nightmares, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

Thirteen Ghosts - Unlucky for some.
I totally agree with all the other negative reviews with regard to the one. Nothing remotely frightening about it - there's more shocks in an episode of Tom and Jerry (and the ghosts are about as scary). The real star of the movie is actually the set. The house is quite cleverly designed and, due to this, I thought this would be an interesting film. Unfortunately, I was wrong. One star (for the set), I'm afraid.

Thirteen Ghosts
This film is REALLY good and VERY scary. I mean REALLY scary. If you are a big fan of gory movie, this is it. Definitely got my money worth.