The Ghost Writer (2010)

starring Ewan McGregor, Pierce Brosnan, Kim Cattrall, and Olivia Williams

Directed by Roman Polanski

Roman Polanski may not be the most well-regarded man...and rightly so.  But in terms of his films, I think he is quite the talented director.  Rosemary's Baby is one of my favorite films of all time.

Unfortunately, The Ghost Writer just can't compare with that near masterpiece, and Polanski as the co-screenwriter is partly to blame.  This film had some of the most ridiculous dialog I've heard in quite a while.  When you have, for all intents and purposes, a mature thriller that is aimed at intelligent adults, you need to have dialog that will not cause me to laugh out loud.  Unfortunately, The Ghost Writer is sometimes hilariously inept at showcasing believable conversations.

Ewan McGregor is The Ghost (his character is never named), a writer called in to help pen the memoirs of British politician Adam Lang (Brosnan) after Lang's first ghost writer mysteriously turns up dead, washed up along the shores in a small New England town.  As is the case in most political thrillers, things are not as they seem and twists and turns are inevitable.

McGregor and Brosnan are quite good in the flick, but their female counterparts, Kim Cattrall and Olivia Williams don't step up to the plate, with Cattrall sporting one of the silliest off-and-on British accents I've heard in my many years of movie-watching and Williams being an emotional blank slate.  Plus, while the plot itself was interesting enough and Polanski did a more than adequate job of filming it (there were a couple of really neat shots), in the end the film just didn't excite me one bit.  It was all just kinda blah.  And when blah's the best you can do, it doesn't incite much emotion from me one way or the other.

The RyMickey Rating: C