Ghost Ship review

The cost of living in America must be going up fast. How else can you explain respectable actors like Gabriel Byrne and Julianna Margulies (ER's Nurse Hathaway) agreeing to star in execrable bunkum like Ghost Ship other than to pay the rent and make ends meet? Certainly it's not for any artistic value - the film has none.

This is a modern day horror story set on the high seas, which bears a frightening resemblance to the clunky 1999 thriller Virus. That film starred Jamie Lee Curtis and William Baldwin as shipmates battling a vicious alien lifeform aboard an abandoned cruise liner. Ghost Ship throws the high-tech sci-fi nemesis overboard in favour of a demonic supernatural foe in the hope of scaring up an audience.

During a deserved shore leave, Captain Murphy (Gabriel Byrne) and his salvage boat crew are approached by handsome stranger, Ferriman (Desmond Harrington), who works as a weather spotter for the Royal Canadian Air Force. Ferriman believes he has discovered a massive ocean liner drifting aimlessly in the Bering Strait. He suspects it might be the Antonia Graza, an opulent Italian vessel which disappeared without trace in the '60s during a cruise to America.

In exchange for a suitable finder's fee, Ferriman offers Murphy and his shipmates the opportunity to stake a claim to the stricken liner and all its cargo. Murphy and his crew agree to the stranger's tempting proposition, and Ferriman accompanies first mate Epps (Margulies), Dodge (Ron Eldard), Greer (Isaiah Washington), Munder (Karl Urban) and Santos (Alex Dimitriades) on the journey to the Bering Strait.

Sure enough, they find the deserted Antonia Graza where Ferriman had suggested, and Murphy and his crew board the ghost ship to pillage its valuable cargo of gold bullion. However, a terrifying otherworldly force lurks below decks and soon the intruders are running scared for their lives, oblivious to the enemy within their midst.

Ghost Ship capsizes under the weight of all the same hokey horror movie cliches: the group splitting up to explore the network of dark, foreboding corridors and gangways; one character ignoring common sense to investigate the source of a strange noise. Performances are perfunctory - how many ways can the actors scream and grimace? - and were it not for some competent special effects and a devilishly gory opening set-piece the film would have nothing to recommend it.

Margulies brings at least some emotional depth and intelligence to her harpoon-wielding heroine, but she's an exception. Byrne's salty seadog barely has enough screen time to develop a personality, Eldard's love interest is emotionally cold, and the other members of the crew have 'Superfluous To Requirements - Will Die Horribly In Act 2' tattooed on their foreheads.