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Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (12A)
Review: A frost-bitten new instalment of the supernaturally comedic franchise is dedicated to the memory of Ivan Reitman, director of the original Ghostbusters and its sequel, who died in 2022 following the release of the rollicking series reboot Ghostbusters: Afterlife. His son Jason passes the directorial baton to co-writer Gil Kenan for Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire to thaw out a motherlode of nostalgia. The Ecto-1 Cadillac ambulance convertible weaves through city streets, surviving main cast of the 1984 film (minus Sigourney Weaver) reprise their roles, miniature Stay Pufts run amok and Paul Rudd’s goofy science teacher quotes lyrics from Ray Parker Jr’s chart-topping theme song.
Gluttonous ghost Slimer continues to leave his ectoplasmic mark, the New York Public Library witnesses more wanton destruction and one of the original film’s antagonists – Environmental Protection Agency inspector Walter Peck (William Atherton) – is still a thorn in the side of the Ghostbusters. Only now, he wields power as New York’s embittered mayor, who pledges to reduce the iconic firehouse to “a pile of bricks”. Bustin’ ghosts feels good 40 years after that first paranormal investigation, but new additions to the cast including James Acaster’s kooky parabiologist and a horned demon which freezes people in fright, evaporate surprisingly quickly from the memory.
Callie Spengler (Carrie Coon), her children Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and Phoebe (Mckenna Grace) and seismologist boyfriend Gary Grooberson (Rudd) proudly continue the family tradition of capturing phantoms using proton packs and ghost traps from the Ghostbusters firehouse in New York. A fast-paced pursuit of the Hell’s Kitchen Sewer Dragon results in considerable damage to city property and 15-year-old Phoebe is banned from participating in call outs. The crestfallen teenager seeks comfort in a burgeoning friendship with a spectre in limbo named Melody (Emily Alyn Lind).
Soon after, slacker Nadeem Razmaadi (Kumail Nanjiani) unwittingly ushers in a new ice age when he sells his grandmother’s possessions to Dr Raymond Stantz (Dan Aykroyd). Among the trinkets is a brass orb encrusted with hieroglyphs, which imprisons the demon Garraka. This fearsome adversary wields a devastating power known as “the death chill” and the old gang comprising Raymond, Winston (Ernie Hudson), Peter (Bill Murray) and Janine (Annie Potts) answer the ghostbusting call to arms in mankind’s darkest and coldest hour.
Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire retains the light-hearted tone of earlier chapters, bolted to a heavy-handed tale of family unity in adversity with an obvious emotional pay-off. When special effects-laden destruction a la Roland Emmerich’s disaster epic The Day After Tomorrow finally arrives, it’s spectacular but improbably tame. Lead characters stave off a deathly chill in boiler suits and none of the giant ice spears, which erupt from the ground as Manhattan freezes over, are shown to impale a scurrying New Yorker. Perhaps it’s global warming, but we’re witnessing a nice age.
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Horror
Immaculate (18)
Review: According to the good book – my dictionary – “immaculate” is an adjective that can be used to mean perfectly neat and tidy or spotlessly clean. hile the unwanted pregnancy in director Michael Mohan’s psychological horror could indeed be deemed immaculate by conception, there is nothing perfectly neat or tidy about Andrew Lobel’s script set in a remote Italian convent nestled on top of ancient catacombs, which we are informed from the outset are “off limits”. You don’t need divine intervention to scent skulduggery in this isolated religious order and when the beleaguered heroine stumbles upon the shocking truth, her faith is tested as robustly as our credulity.
“If this is not the will of God, why does He not stop us?” coldly argues a perpetrator. Explosions of gratuitous, stomach-churning gore, which don’t serve an increasingly demented plot, punctuate a young nun’s descent into paranoia and delusion with nightmarish echoes of Rosemary’s Baby and Suspiria. Rising star Sydney Sweeney from Anyone But You and Madame Web wears two habits as producer and lead star, fully embracing the escalating madness of her character’s bewildering predicament. Her soul-piercing screams of anguish cut through the overblown melodrama, which relies heavily on jump scares rather than creeping dread to keep audiences teetering on the edge of their seats.
Following a near-death experience in childhood on a frozen lake, Cecilia (Sweeney) fixates on the idea that God saved her for a higher purpose and she studiously dedicates herself to becoming a nun. Scientist-turned-priest Father Sal Tedeschi (Alvaro Morte) kindly extends an invitation to Cecilia to take her vows of poverty, chastity and obedience at a picturesque 17th-century Italian convent. Without any emotional anchors to keep her in Detroit, Michigan, the novitiate relocates to a European country where she barely speaks the language to serve the Lord under Cardinal Franco Merola (Giorgio Colangeli) and an imposing Mother Superior (Dora Romano).
Cecilia is warmly welcomed by Father Tedeschi but fellow nun Sister Gwen (Benedetta Porcaroli) cryptically urges caution: “He has a talent for sniffling out broken birds.” Shortly after her arrival, Cecilia falls ill and a visit from Doctor Gallo (Giampiero Judica) confirms she is with child. However, Cecilia is a virgin. Catapulted to overnight stardom by virtue of her miraculous conception, Cecilia senses something unholy festers inside the convent’s walls.
Structured as trimesters of Cecilia’s unwanted pregnancy, Immaculate relies on Sweeney’s full-blooded central performance to successfully carry a loopy premise to full term. A ruthlessly efficient prologue sets the macabre tone and demonstrates director Mohan’s enthusiasm for icky make-up effects to secure an 18 certificate in the UK. Emotion is sacrificed at the altar of splatter as Cecilia’s fight for survival reaches an overwrought crescendo. Forgive the filmmakers – their sins are disappointingly few.
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