Ghost Ship (2002)


In case you happened to stumble in here (it will probably be years before someone actually does), remember the 2002 movie Ghost Ship? Was that film a remake of this? Or similar at all? I don't like atmospheric horror films (though I have seen this one)... so I won't be seeing the new one...

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I did not realize there was another human being who had seen Death Ship. I check the IMDB facts page for this film quite often to see if anyone has any interest in the movie. To answer your question, yes this year's Ghost Ship is very similar to Death Ship. However, Death Ship, though shoddy and not as well-made, is more effective. And though the poster art for Ghost Ship totally rips off Death Ship's (I guess the studio is safe because after all who the hell has ever seen Death Ship?), it is off course not the first film with the concept of a haunted ship. Please respond if you get this. It's gonna kill me if no one makes another post here. lol thanks.


Jeff

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My god! Finally someone else who has seen Death Ship. I remember renting it back in about 83 when we got our first VCR. It scared the hell out of me. Recently, I caught it on late night TV and it's still creepy, but not as scary as I remembered (I was 13 at the time.)

The poster for Ghost Ship immediately caught my eye because I had nightmares about that damn Death Ship Poster for months after. I still can't believe the similarities. Right down to the same point of view. The producers had to be aware of it - I suspect Jeff, that you're right. I guess I'm going to have to see the new one. I don't like horror "gore" films, I like the suspense variety, but what the hell. I'm too curious to pass it up.



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Me too, here, I re-visited the IMDb entry for Death Ship (after searching for "movie Nazi ship" - strange enough, it's listing Death Ship links first) after seeing the "Ghost Ship"-DVD.

Well, Ghost Ship was made by Steve Beck and Dark Castle; both made also the William-Castle-Remake 13 Ghosts (where can I get the original?), and Dark Castle also seems to have made the Castle-Remake of House on Haunted Hill (where can I get the original?).

So, all in all, it doesn't wonder me much that Dark Castle films are rip-offs; 13 Ghosts also was not very scary (and not very convincing, either). I only saw the trailer for Ghost Ship, but the Ghosts seem to get faces and voices, which contradicts the Horror-of-the-Unknown-and-Vague of Death Ship. Hell, I saw that movie as a teen, and had nightmares days after!

I think I will watch Ghost Ship (and then decide whether the DVD is worth it); if somebody knows if there is a RC-2 DVD of Death Ship, English language mandatory, German track a bonus, please let me know; I'd pay 8 Euros tops for it.

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Seen it alright. It was on a Saturday matinee years ago. I couldn't watch Dallas later that evening for fear of Carter McKay showing up ha ha.

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I saw it too. I don't remember how old I was but I'm sure I was under 10. Scared the hell out of me. I can't remember though, is there a scene where a woman is either covered in boils or or her skin melts off or something? I remember the bloody shower scene, everyone does I think, but no one mentions any other scenes.

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Why har noone mentioned the 1980s film "Death ship"? Now, admittedly it´s a really long time since I saw that one, but I recalled it at once when I saw "Ghost ship". ...And just now I found the poster from the 1980s film here on IMDB. The posters are so alike that it´s actually quite funny. Has noone seen the old film? Am I getting that old? (Born ´68)

-Icelander

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Well, there are those of us out there that have seen this movie. I love it though I doubt the letters D, V or D are anywhere in it's future. However, I promise you that if I ever become a famous writer or filmmaker as I would someday like to be, mark my words, I will buy the rights to the film and have DVD experts make the proper DVD in widesreen. The movie is just so nightmare-ishly dreamy- the overcast skies, the ship itself. The film gives me a nightmare around twice every four months regardless of whether I have viewed it within that time frame. Some are quite horrifying though the ship never truly does anything physically to me in the dreams. It just is simply there and the mere pressence of it sends chills up my spines. Usually I am aboard the ship on either an overcast day or at some foggy twilight. It's so strange! Sometimes the ship is capsized with it's end sticking ou above the surface like some kind of demonic SS Poseidon and I'll be on another boat just watching it. I will never forget Death Ship and will always try to find people who have been equally effected by it. I first saw the video in a dusty video corner of a Pharm-mor, a mid-western US chain of grocery/variety stores, when I was a child and though I never rented it the video always stuck with me and and a couple years ago I bought a copy on-line and finally saw it. I think I might try finding the rights to it. Though I could never afford them it would be interesting to see. Well, keep posting! I want to see if anyone stumbles back in here.

"I've seen things in this city that make Dante's Inferno read like Winnie The Pooh."

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When I first saw the movie poster for Ghost Ship, I had thought that they were going to re-make this movie. I was wrong. They were just ripping off the poster art. Of the two, I liked Death Ship better because it had a greater impact on me when I saw it. Keep in mind, I was only 12 at the time. Nevertheless, 15 years or so later, I still enjoy this movie.

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DEATH SHIP is largely a bad movie, but a frightening one. I'm so glad other people have seen it and have agreed.

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I was born in '68 too. My sister snuck me in to see Death Ship when I was 12. We actually went to see it a few times but I've never seen it on tv or video since. Would love to see it again.
I immediately saw the poster and recognized the art because somwehere I had a scrapbook and I had glued the ad from the newspaper in my book. The pre-video days when you would see a movie and not have anything but the movie ad in the scrapbook to remember it by unless a book came out or the movie was rereleased.

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Death Ship with George Kennedy from 1980 was a great horror film. Although it was low budge and not very well made, it worked on so many levels. I saw this film as a double feature with Screams of a Winter Night and went home trembling that night. What a great concept the double feature was.

Anyway, the great low budge horror films of the late 70's and 80's need to be rereleased (read, rereleased, not REMADE). Films such as Death Ship, Screams of a Winter Night, Fade to Black, Prophecy, Phantasm, The Brood, Rabid, etc. need to be appreciated more. Instead we get crap, like remakes of The Fog, Halloween, When a Stranger Calls.

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"No one" is two words.

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"Ghost Ship" and "Death Ship" have absolutly nothing to do with each other in the least. They are some 20 years apart and the only similarity is that they both take place on a ship. Death Ship was piggy backing the early 80's fasination with the "dead camper" horror flicks, only they set there slaughter ground on a boat, not a campsite. I saw Death Ship in the Theater when it first came out in 1980 and I own the Video today.

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I haven't seen it. Is it good and should I rent it?

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Is it just me, or does the ship on the poster for death ship look like a pirate ship to anyone else even though it's supposed to be a nazi torture boat? What about Ghost Ships (too actiony to be scary in my opinion)? The ship on the front cover poster looks like it's a type of ship off the titanics design, or something, yet he Antonia Graza has a painted body with several thick stripes of black. Anyone notice these mistakes? Plus, does anyone know where I might be able to see death ship. It has to be scary. Ghost Ship was just gross, and too much action to be scary which is what made the Haunting not scary too. So does anyone know, cuz I really want to see Death Ship.

Leave it to Beaver...and you'll be sorry you did!

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I'm also a huge fan of B-movie horror movies - I love find that diamond in the rough. For years, my best friend and I have had a ritual of going to the local video store and renting horror movies each weekend. Since he's moved away and only now visits a few times a year I've been renting more, trying to recapture those wonderful childhood memories of scary horror movies I grew up on. I remember seeing the VHS of this at the video store for years, well, today I finally rented it and although it's not the best horror movie I've seen it I'm glad I saw it. I've always liked George Kennedy and he did an admiral job in this one, no pun intended.

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Awesome wrightwe. I never really had a friend to watch Movies with (well, enough friends, but no one near as fanatical as I am, and mostly into mainstream), so I usually end up watching these sort of films alone.

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Um the design of the Antonia Graza is based off of the Andrea Doria, not Titanic and it was fairly well done.

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This might be dating me.. but I remember seeing Death Ship in something called A "Drive-In" with my parents (I was about 9 or ten at the time) and loving it. I was able to catch it on tv a few times. Great movie and better than that Ghost Ship thing.

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I remember this film.. loved it.. heard about Ghost Ship and thought it was a remake.. thankfully it wasn't - Ghost Ship was utter crap compared to Death Ship - which is why I posted - had to say it.

Forgive the unstructured nature of this post :)

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When I learned that the movie "Ghost Ship" was about to debut, I was fairly sure, despite the outrageous appropriation of the poster imagery, that it was not going to be a remake of "Death Ship", but I went to see it anyway because tales of haunted ships are rare in any case and I wanted to see what, if any, influences might be evident from the earlier film.
Well, both movies take a single basic premise - people coming upon a huge, haunted, seagoing derelict - and succeed in crafting two completely diverging plot-lines, the resulting contrast making them worth viewing together, if you can. To its credit, "GS" is a wholly separate beast from "DS", with the title vessel being of a different type ( a luxury liner rather than a freighter ), approached under completely different circumstances ( a salvage crew in search of treasure, instead of disaster survivors seeking aid ), with differing supernatural manifestations ( specters visible in hallucinative visions that lure the unwary to doom, as opposed to the possession of one man by a seemingly sentient ship crewed by invisible if audible spirits that take victims merely when opportunity seems to arise ), and with entirely differing outcomes ( which I shall not reveal here ).
As to which is the superior film...to make a decision in this instance is like weighing ketchup and salsa; it all depends on your personal taste in how you like your thrills and chills served up. Both movies have ships in a state of clear decay, both scripts fill these decrepit hulks with some cleverly macabre aspects, and both styles have alternative views on what "macabre" ideally is.
"Death Ship" has eerie sound effects, but a lousy music score. "Ghost Ship" has a female protagonist and a very sexy chanteuse, but not nudity. "GS" has a smooth, classy look to it, but it isn't light on its feet. "DS" delves deeper into psychic manipulation, but uses VERY unorthodox editing. If you prefer bigger-budget special effects, go with "GS". If you fancy your spooks visible, or your carnage raw and up front, ditto. If you don't mind a few unintentional laughs, then "DS" is definitely for you. Likewise if you relish overacting, or disaster movies of the '70s, or a movie that doesn't explain too much backstory.
And, lastly, if it's people you can root for that you want most of all, "Death Ship" comes closer; but if, rather, it's spooks you can feel for, seek out "Ghost Ship" instead.
So ( by my taste ), what it all comes down to, in the end, is this: When it comes to cheesy horror, "Ghost Ship" is a soft and tangy Brie; "Death Ship" is a firm, sharp Cheddar.

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Well put crselvz.

Defer not unto the evening, that which the morning may accomplish.

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So that makes about 45 "Death Ship" fans worldwide now right? Death Ship still comes up as a comedic punchline between my brother and I both we're both glad that we watched it. So he would make 46...

539

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47.

It was the staple film poster in all video shops - along with The Wanderers, Cuckoo's Nest and Jaws.

I never watched it when I was into video nasties, but I recently got hold of it after seeing the trailer on a dvd, of trailers of bad films from the 70s and 80s.
Unadulterated rubbish, but eminently watchable

You go inside the cage?
Cage goes in the water, you go in the water. Shark's in the water

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48. I remember asking my parents to rent this based on the strength of the poster art(makes me miss the days when kids based all their rentals on how cool the covers were). Years later, Ghost Ship came along and, like the typical flavor-of-the-week horror film, everybody talked about it for a day or two. I scoffed and insisted that the "new" movie was ripping off Death Ship(of course no one knew what the hell I was talking about).

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The poster maybe, and some similar ideas, but GHOST SHIP is no remake. DEATH SHIP is much creepier I might add.


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