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It’s
time to take the plunge into the gimmicky
world of one William H. Castle. So grab
your Illusion-O glasses, and a
12-pack of your favorite brew, as we go
searching for not one, or two, but 13
Ghosts...
We
start in the Los Angeles County Museum,
where Cyrus Zorba (Don
Woods) lectures a group of
students, focusing on the dangers
prehistoric creatures encountered while
getting trapped in the La Brea Tar Pits. (Which
in some ways is blatant foreshadowing for
the haunted house we’re about to
encounter.) The lecture is
interrupted by a phone call from Cyrus's
wife, Hilda (Rosemary De Camp).
Seems that the Zorbas aren’t exactly
rich -- and the collection agency has just
reclaimed all of their furniture. And
that's why son Buck’s (Charles
Herbert) birthday is celebrated on
the floor of an empty apartment, where the
family gifts him yet another book of ghost
stories. Though his sister, Medea (Jo
Morrow -- who appears to be in her early
30’s but is supposed to be in her late
teens), chides her brother on his
reading habits, after presenting the cake
and candles, they all ask Buck to make a
wish. Wishing for a big house, with lots
of furniture, an ominous wind kicks up and
blows Buck's candles out for him. (Ominous
wind blowing will be a reoccurring theme
here.)
Then
fate knocks on the door: a messenger,
bearing notice of a meeting with attorney
Ben Rush (Martin
Milner -- of Adam
12
fame.) Cyrus hopes it isn’t
another collection agency looking for
money. It's not; it's good news. Sort of.
His uncle, Dr. Plato Zorba, has recently
passed away and left him his entire
estate, consisting of a large mansion and
a mysterious package. Rush also informs
them that even though Plato was a very
rich, he was also very eccentric, leaving
no existing bank accounts; so there is no
lump sum of money. Undaunted, the family
is very excited about the prospect of
moving into the mansion, but Rush warns
them against it; for it seems Dr. Zorba
was into the occult and collected ghosts.
And several ghosts still haunt his
mansion. And like it or not, they’re
part of the inheritance as well.
After
Rush leaves to get some papers, Cyrus and
Hilda decide to risk opening the
mysterious package. When Cyrus breaks the
seal, the wind kicks up again, ominously. (See,
I told ya.) But the packages only
contents are a strange pair of glasses. (We’ll
call them X-Ray Specs.) Then a
plastic fly -- on a very visible string --
begins buzzing them, and when the faux fly
lands on X-ray Specs, it gets
electrocuted.
Great,
Uncle Plato left them his favorite bug
zapper.
Time
passes and the Zorba clan settle into
their new home, which comes complete with
furnishings -- and even includes Elaine,
their very own maid (Margaret
Hamilton -- the old Wicked Witch of the
West herself.) Rush brings the last
of the paperwork that Cyrus has to sign,
making everything officially his. (And
I guess it’s as good a time as any to
state that Medea has a crush on the lawyer.)
As Cyrus signs the dotted line,
Buck finds an Ouija board in a secret
compartment near the fireplace. They also
find Dr. Zorba’s diary in the same
hidey-hole. Written in Latin, Rush offers
to have the journal translated but Cyrus
says his boss, Van Allen (John Van
Dreelen), can translate it. With
that settled, thinking it will be a real
hoot,
they decide to try the board. First, Buck
asks if the house is really haunted, and
the board answers, 'Yes'. A few more
questions reveals there are thirteen
ghosts still roaming the house. And then
comes a warning that one of them is in
danger! When they ask whom -- cue ominous
wind -- Plato’s portrait falls
off the wall, barely missing Buck, and
crashes to the floor, then the wooden
pointer of the Ouija board goes airborne
-- on its own -- and points toward Medea.
I'm
guessing that was just too much for
everybody, because they all decide to turn
in. Unnerved, Hilda doesn’t like it and
wants to leave. Cyrus (who
I must say is the biggest idiot I’ve
ever seen on screen) gives the old
scientific explanation speech to calm her
down, and states that they can’t leave:
there is a stipulation in Plato’s will
that they have to live in the house or
forfeit it to the government. (#*&%#$%
I.R.S.) Checking on his kids,
Cyrus hears a ghostly wail down the hall.
He collects the X-Ray Specs and traces the
noises to a secret lab. Something is
definitely in there with him, but he
can’t quite make it out -- until he puts
on the glasses, which magically allows him
to see the specter: a fiery pinwheel that
attacks him, and the number thirteen is
burned into his arm.
I'm
sure there's a scientific explanation
for that, too.
The
next day at the museum, Van Allen begins
translating the diary. The pages reveal
that Plato created the X-Ray Specs so he
could see ghosts. He also had a theory
that if you could see them, you could
capture and control them. Traveling around
the world, then, he captured an
international array of spooks. His final
entries state that Plato himself is
ghost number twelve. This bit befuddles
Cyrus because the Ouija board said there
were thirteen ghosts loose in the house.
Hilda
calls Cyrus home, because ghost is running
amok and making a mess of the kitchen.
Buck says it's Emilio -- a chef, who
killed his whole family with a meat clever.
I
was getting a nice Sixth
Sense
vibe, here, but it was only the maid who
told Buck about the ghosts. Well, so
much for that...
Next
comes some important plot exposition when
Cyrus and Hilda question Elaine, who
reveals that she was Plato’s assistant
until he died. She adds that she began to
worry when he started acting strange. No,
not the ghost stuff (that
was normal for Dr. Zorba.);
it was the liquefying of all his assets
and the emptying of his bank accounts that
concerned her. This all started after he
met Ben Rush. (Hmm? I wonder? Nah!) And
then Plato died -- under mysterious
circumstances -- following a meeting with
the attorney. (That’s odd. Maybe...nah,
couldn’t be.) After the
funeral, Elaine and Rush searched
the house for the money but found nothing.
And the history lesson ends with a warning
to stay out of the bedroom where Plato
died, and frankly, the old maid encourages
them to just leave before it's too late.
But
Cyrus (being the idiot that he is)
goes straight to Plato’s bedroom (cue
ominous wind), where a free
floating candle shows him that the bed was
booby-trapped. If a switch is turned, the
bed's canopy lowers and crushes the
occupant. (Curiouser and
Curiouser.)
Later,
Rush and Medea return from a date. Rush
implores her to convince the family to
leave because it’s just too dangerous to
stay. (Geez,
he really wants them out of there. Could
it be that?…nah.) No sale; they
won't leave, but she promises to be
careful. But later
that night, while she sleeps, Medea is
assaulted by a ghostly figure. (Science!)
The
next morning, Buck finds the magic X-Ray Specs
and Plato’s lab. Rummaging around, he
finds the equipment of Shadrack the Great.
(Well, maybe not so great as the
lion tamer wound up losing his head to a
big cat.) Buck puts the glasses on
and sees not only the headless Shadrack --
but his lions as well.
Okay,
I'll admit I laughed when the headless
ghost looked in the lion’s mouth for
his missing head.
Buck
also finds a wad of $100 bills that
he jarred loose from a hidey-hole
while riding down the banister. Rush shows
up, sees the money, and wants to know
where he found it. Buck isn’t quite
sure, so Rush tells him there's a secret
treasure somewhere in the house and
they'll have to find it. Swearing Buck to
secrecy, Rush says they will surprise the
family after they find the money.
Okay,
it’s pretty obvious now but…nah.
Later,
Cyrus meets up with Rush at the museum.
The attack on Medea finally convinced him
that they have to move before someone
really gets hurt. Glad to hear it, Rush
promises that through some legal
finagling, he can’t get Cyrus around
$10000 for the house. Van Allen interrupts
them; he’s translated another diary
entry that says Plato hid all his money
somewhere in the house. He also says that
Plato and Elaine held frequent séances.
Cyrus then hits upon a plan to have a séance
to try and contact his late uncle, to find
out where he hid all the money.
Cyrus,
Hilda, Medea and Elaine start the séance.
Hilda wouldn't allow Buck to
participate, but he decides to snoop in on
the proceedings anyway. He rides down the
banister again, jarring the secret
compartment completely open this time, and
it's filled with Plato’s treasure. Rush
sneaks in and prevents Buck from telling
everybody, convincing the boy that it will
make a wonderful surprise in the morning
before they leave the house. Proving that gullibility
is an inherited trait, Buck agrees and
heads to bed.
Back
at the séance, Plato begins to channel
himself through Cyrus. Speaking through
his nephew, he warns that one of them -- that
very night, will become the 13th
Ghost.
But
wouldn't that be the fourteenth ghost?
Never mind, I think the movie's almost
over...
So
what do they do? Get the heck out of there
before one of them ends up dead? Heck no.
They turn in for the evening. Cyrus (the
moron) makes his customary bed
check on his family, then hits the hay.
Meanwhile,
in one of the most anti-climactic
"Well duh!" moments in cinematic
history, the ghostly figure that attacked
Medea is revealed to be Rush.
Collecting the sleeping Buck, he takes
him to Plato’s room and lays him on the
booby-trapped bed, then throws the switch
and the heavy canopy slowly lowers
down...down...down...
Luckily,
the ghost of Uncle Plato is on the ball. (Cue
ominous wind.) When the specter
attacks Rush, Buck wakes up during the
tussle. He gets off the bed, and then
watches as Plato's ghost pushes Rush onto
the deadly spot he vacated. Buck screams,
waking up the rest of the family, but it's
too late for Rush as the bed crushes the
crook.
Which
leaves us with the denouement: Cyrus (who
finally catches up with the rest of us)
explains that Rush killed Plato and was
trying to scare everybody off so he could
find the money. (Brilliant
deduction there Einstein. The rest of us
figured that out over an hour ago.)
Hilda wants to buy a new house with the
money, but Elaine assures them that the
ghosts will no longer be a problem. With
that, the family gleefully goes into the
kitchen for breakfast.
Elaine
smirks, the X-Ray Specs explode, and all
thirteen ghosts escort us out of the
house. And when the door slams shut, a
ghostly 'For Sale' sign appears on the
door.
Good,
god. Is it over yet!?
The
End
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"One-Adam-12.
One-Adam-12. See the man about a
ghost. Over." |
If
you couldn’t tell already, I’m not the
biggest fan of this film. It would
probably help if it weren’t so bloody
obvious that Rush was the bad guy -- and
that Cyrus is such a dunderhead to not see
how bloody obvious it really is. Somebody
done got their Richard Carlson mixed up
with their Hugh Marlowe and begat Don
Woods. The man says 'Golly' (GOLLY!)
at least four times. (Did I mention
that Cyrus is an idiot?)
Basically
or unfortunately or whatever, once you
figure out that Rush is the bad guy, then
the rest of the film is just padding until
everybody else figures it out and catches
up. And it's maddening how meandering this
film can be. I did get a chuckle, though,
out of the casts exotic names; from Plato
to Cyrus to Medea. (Maybe
Buck is short for Ulysses?)
Another
large-mongous problem the film has is the
gimmick of Illusion-O itself. If
you saw the film in the theater, you were
given a pair of tinted glasses [See
Illustration above and to the left.] If
you looked through the red filter, you saw
the ghosts. If you looked through the
blue, you were spared the gruesome sights.
(You
chickens.) Unfortunately, on video,
we get a composite and you can barely make
any of the ghosts out at all. If
a monster movie is bad, the only thing you
have to look forward to is getting a good
look at the monsters. That's it. And if
you can’t even get that accomplished,
what chance does a bad film have?
I
do enjoy Castles’ other work (although
I never saw what the big deal was about Rosemary’s
Baby),
and would love to see them in a theater
with the gimmicks intact -- even 13
Ghosts.
As for the 13
Ghosts
home video experience? If I had the
decision cards for Mr.
Sardonicus,
I’d give it a big thumbs down.
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