Check out social media, be it You tube, TikTok, Instagram or whatever people have a range of bizarre challenges that believe it or not, have a massive fan following. There are some that have gained massive popularity such as the ice bucket or the cinnamon challenges, and then there are some such as the fire challenge that have dire consequences within some cases, even death. Then there’s the “Ghost Game” where people break into others’ houses for the purpose of filming their residents without their consent while they are inside the house.
Laura (Kia Dorsey) is one of its participants and mostly completes these video challenges with her bestie and partner in crime, Adrian (Sam Lukowski). The duo are underground internet celebrities of sorts, but all of that comes crashing down when Laura’s boyfriend Vin (Zain Haidar) learns of her hobby and begins to extract revenge by replacing Adrian in the process. This doesn’t change the fact however that Adrian will still manage do everything to sabotage Laura and Vin’s first video – which is Vin’s plan. Vin and Laura’s first video is centered around a haunted house with a family that has just moved in.
Despite Ghost Game’s use of certain GoPro POV and hidden house camera angles, the film still relies on classical filmmaking methods in order to advance the story. In a lot of ways, the film actually gets rid of a variety of horror film cliches such as the haunted house complete with a fatal backstory, some unexplainable activities which Laura, Adrian and Vin have to encounter, or sudden jumps in surprise, all for the sake of keeping you off balance and constantly guessing. The cunning deviance amuses but diverts attention from certain aspects of the film which were poorly executed.
It is not all that scary and the story at times appears to be a stretch. Apart from the clever misdirects, what “Ghost Game” should be gobbled up in gasps because of the likeable characters who are caught in a volatile and intensifying plot. And that is not to say that even as we adore these characters we do not feel a little sick pleasure when they are punished. We at this moment relish seeing social media personalities and others getting what they deserve when they do something stupid and dangerous just for the thrill of it.
While the characters grow ever more suspicious, we wait for that retribution which is after all the crux of ‘Ghost Game’. Laura has decided to take part in these challenges because who wants to lead a normal life when there’s a lot already going on in the world and life such as the relationship between Vin, Adrian, and her. To put it very mildly, Vin and Adrian stand for two conflicting sides of Laura, and that very aurora she tries to resolve throughout the motion picture. The same kind of emotional depth was present in Director Jill Gevargizian’s previous picture ‘The Stylist’.
Director Jill Gevargizian’s latest film, “Ghost Game”, while still possessing certain admirable features, is far more flawed than its predecessor: “The Stylist” – and it’s likely that these flaws are linked to the fact that Gevargizian did not author the script for this sequel. According to writer Adam Cesare, who certainly researched many books on the subject of genre blending, should probably figure out how to make it work in the cut more fluently into a warm and exciting thriller. Despite of ton of shortcomings, “Ghost Game” is funny, entertaining, and quite unexpectedly the classic ‘haunted house’ film with a spectacle of characters arguing in a rather comical fashion. If the film’s first showing at the Panic Fest in 2024 is any guide, it’s sure to endear fans.
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