Ghost Dad (1990)

Nowadays, it’s not a big deal to see an actor on both television and in movies. But back in the earlier days of television, before the rise of prestige shows and respected cable networks, television was a stepping-stone to something bigger. It was a way to get to the silver screen and find even bigger fame and money. It was a path to future success and wasn’t the success, in and of itself.

Television stars of old were always looking for the right moment to transition out of television and into movies. Some of them found the success that they were looking for. They would skyrocket into some of the biggest stars in the movie industry. Tom Hanks came from the television show Bosom Buddies to become someone that audiences loved to watch in the most popular movies. Denzel Washington sprung out of St. Elsewhere to become a respected actor in his own right. There were some major success stories coming from the move from small screen to big.

Other stars didn’t fare nearly as well, however, and either fizzled out or went back to television. One of the biggest of those was David Caruso. He found success as Detective John Kelly on NYPD Blue. This prompted him to leave the show early in the second season to try and make a run at a film career. It didn’t happen and he ended up back on television, starring in the successful CSI: Miami, and creating a meme that would last forever. Yeah.

Bill Cosby sort of fit into both the success and failure of a film career. He was a majorly successful television star. He came to prominence in the television show I Spy in the late 1960s before creating his successful animated show Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, which began in 1972 and lasted well into the 1980s. Then he went on to The Cosby Show, a massively successful sitcom that ran from 1984 until 1992. All that television success primed him for a feature film career, multiple times.

His film career began in the 1970s with some mild success. Throughout that decade, he made a trio of films with Sidney Poitier. Each one starred Poitier and Cosby and was directed by Poitier. He made a couple other films, before slowing that part of his career and heading back to television. Once he found more television success from The Cosby Show, he would head back to the big screen. And he would attempt to capture the same big screen magic from the 1970s. That was because Bill Cosby would reteam with Sidney Poitier for a 1990 family film.

Ghost Dad told the story of Elliot Hopper (Bill Cosby), a hard-working father who spent much more time with his job than with his family. His wife had passed away a few years earlier, so Elliot had to work harder to earn more money to support his children. Diane (Kimberly Russell) was the eldest child and had to essentially take care of her brother, Danny (Salim Grant), and sister, Amanda (Brooke Fontaine). After a long day at work, Elliot got into a taxi, which was involved in an accident. Next thing he knew, he was a ghost. But he needed to live on for three more days to get a promotion that would keep his kids out of poverty.

Sidney Poitier directed the family flick, but he didn’t appear on screen. It was the first time that he collaborated with Bill Cosby without also being featured in a leading role. The movie felt tailored to fit the family reputation that Cosby had gained through years of Fat Albert and The Cosby Show. (It was still a couple decades before the family persona would be shattered by the news that Cosby had been sexually abusing and raping women throughout his entire career.) The main difference was that his character in Ghost Dad seemed to care more about his job and spent the movie learning that his family was the most important thing, where Cliff Huxtable from The Cosby Show was a family man as much as anything else.

This, as well as the lack of a matriarch in the family, allowed a different side of Cosby to be seen by the people who were introduced to him through his family television shows. He got to play a slightly different character who had to become a family man, rather than a character who already was. It was a different shade of something familiar, something new enough for audiences to be interested in, while being similar to something that they already knew, giving them comfort. It was exactly what Cosby should have been doing in a movie at that time.

And sometimes it worked like gangbusters. There were moments where the comedy landed exceptionally well. There was a man introduced to help guide Elliot through his new ghostly life. The character was named Edith. The man pronounced the name “Ed-ith,” saying that it was a boy’s name. Everyone felt the need to point out that it was spelled the same as “Ee-dith,” a girl’s name, which frustrated him to no end. That worked. It got called back to throughout the movie.

Another thing that worked was an early gag where Elliot couldn’t speak properly in his ghost form because he was out of sync with himself. Nobody could hear him, so he had to telepathically try and interact with them. When he did that, it sounded pained, somewhere between a scream, a yawn, and a gargle. Things like that kept the movie afloat, making it watchable. The problem was that those elements were few and far between.

The rest of Ghost Dad was sprinkled with good jokes. On paper, that is. The ideas were humourous and interesting. The execution, however, was anything but. This could have come down to the direction of Sidney Poitier. It could have come down to the performance of Bill Cosby. It could have come down to the writing of the three screenwriters who worked on the film. Somewhere along the way, many of the amusing bits and pieces that made Ghost Dad a good idea fell apart. They didn’t land the way they should have. It made the movie a chore to get through.

One example was the early gag where the movie played with the audience’s expectations about when Elliot would become a ghost. The title was Ghost Dad. Of course he would become a ghost. Different near-death scenarios played out as Elliot neared his demise. He almost slipped on Amanda’s roller skate and fell down the stairs. He almost died in an elevator, where the cable snapped right after he left it. The problem was that the amount of time spent on these various gags was far too long. It felt like the movie took forever to get Elliot into his Ghost Dad state. There weren’t too many gags. It was played by the rule of threes, a classic comedic timing style. The problem was that each of them lasted too long in terms of storytelling. They took up too much screentime.

Bill Cosby was a slight problem as well. It wasn’t so much in his portrayal of the character. He did a fine job as a mostly absent father learning to care for his kids when he needs their help to help them. His facial expressions were a major problem. Something that should have been a serious moment, such as Elliot discovering he was a ghost, was ruined by a goofy facial expression, such as when a bus drove through Elliot and he realized he was going face first into a woman’s crotch. Many times, the expressions didn’t fit the tone of the scene or moment they were in, thus lessening the impact of important story beats.

Comedy might be a subjective thing, but there were reasons it didn’t quite stick in Ghost Dad. There was one other thing that took away from the movie as well, and that was the effects. The early 1990s effects didn’t quite manage to feel realistic. There were moments where some fun little camera tricks were used to make Elliot appear and disappear when lights were turned on and off. These were the same sort of tricks that were done in the short film Lights Out to great effect. But there were also other moments where Elliot had a bus go through him, or he fell through a door and into the floor, or he was thrown through the sky on a trip to England. Any moment where he interacted with the environment around him. These moments didn’t look good, breaking any sense of believability. Movies don’t always need to be realistic, but when they’re going for a grounded, family story with a ghostly twist, they should probably be able to stick the landing.

Sidney Poitier’s reunion with Bill Cosby wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. There would have been some hype around it, with a screen duo reuniting after a decade and a half apart. But one of them didn’t appear on screen, and the movie was mired in comedy that never quite found its stride. There were some funny jokes on the page that never translated to the screen. The effects couldn’t support what the story required. And, thirty years out, what Bill Cosby did to all those women must be reconciled by the viewer. This may not have been the worst of that era of Cosby’s feature film career, but it certainly wasn’t a good example of his comedic talent.

Bill Cosby reached his second movie wind following the success of The Cosby Show. He decided to revive a film career that had flourished for him in the 1970s, following I Spy. With that came a reunion with Sidney Poitier, who had directed and starred in three films with him during that earlier run. It was television success begetting a film career and then more television success leading to another peak in a film career. Television was the stepping-stone that made films a possibility.

Many actors made the leap from television to feature films. That was the way things worked from the incarnation of television until relatively recently. It might be normal now to see a movie star take a chance to be in a television show for a season or two. But before the rise of cable channels and what people consider the golden age of television, work in television was considered beneath film. It was considered lesser than. It was considered a way to get to the bigger and better. And it brought us many a great movie star.

Now for some notes to close this thing out, and there are a lot of them:

• J.D. Hall did some acting work in Ghost Dad, after also being featured in Mac and Me (week 125), Jaws: The Revenge (week 240), and The Scorpion King 3: Battle for Redemption (week 380).
• David McCharen returned to Sunday “Bad” Movies. He was first in Monster in the Closet (week 55) and Jaws: The Revenge (week 240). Now he has been in Ghost Dad.
• Cathy Cavadini worked on Jaws: The Revenge (week 240), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (week 310), and Ghost Dad.
• Five actors from Jaws: The Revenge (week 240) were in Ghost Dad. They were Barbara Harris, Doris Hess, Kaleena Kiff, Cedric Scott, and LaGloria Scott.
• Arnold Stang made a memorable appearance in Ghost Dad. He was also in Hercules in New York (week 68).
• Denise Nicholas, from Blacula (week 82), was featured in Ghost Dad.
• Ghost Dad featured Donzaleigh Abernathy from Leprechaun: Back 2 Tha Hood (week 120).
• Joseph Chapman and Christine Ebersole were both in Ghost Dad and Mac and Me (week 125).
• There was an actor named James McIntire in Road House (week 200) and Ghost Dad.
• Amy Hill made her second Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance in Ghost Dad, after previously doing voice work in The Emoji Movie (week 373).
• Finally, Patrika Darbo was in The Search for Santa Paws (week 420) and Ghost Dad.
• Have you seen Ghost Dad? What did you think? Who are some of your favourite television stars turned film stars? Put your thoughts in the comments or connect with me on Twitter.
• You can find me on Twitter or in the comments if you want to share any suggestions about what movies I should be watching for Sunday “Bad” Movies. I’m open to all suggestions and will likely toss them into the schedule at some point in the future.
• Sunday “Bad” Movies is on Instagram, if you want to check that out as well.
• Now for a little info about next week’s movie. Next week is Easter weekend, which meant that I was obviously going to tie something into that. Yes, it’s another religious film. It’s not any religious film, though. There’s some special stuff to this one. It features former Cheetah Girl member Adrienne Bailon. It features Fyre Fest founder Ja Rule. It features Stephen Baldwin, Michael Madsen, and Vincent Pastore. Christian musicians T-Bone and TobyMac also show up. So does retired football star Jerry Rice. I’ll be writing about I’m in Love with a Church Girl, and I hope you’ll come back for that. It should be a fun post. See you next week.

Evil Bong: High 5 (2016)

There was a time in my movie-watching life where I would buy any box set of movies if it was cheap. It didn’t matter if the box set was popular movies that I had seen before or ten unknown, low budget horror flicks I had never heard of. For the right price, I would put the set in my shopping cart and head off to pay for it. Now I have numerous box sets that I’ll likely never get all the way through.

Many of the movies in the cheaper box sets helped fuel the schedule for Sunday “Bad” Movies. I could look at any of the movies, choose one, and toss it into the schedule. That’s how I first discovered the Evil Bong franchise. One of the box sets had the first movie in it. The name, alone, sounded like something that would fit the blog. I tossed it in, watched it, and went onto the next week. Soon, I would find the second Evil Bong movie on another box set and I would plug that into Sunday “Bad” Movies. Now, I’m six movies into the franchise and it doesn’t look like I’ll be stopping anytime soon.

Evil Bong: High 5 was the fifth installment of the series, but sixth of the franchise. There had been a crossover movie following the first three. Larnell (John Patrick Jordan), Rabbit (Sonny Carl Davis), Sarah Leigh (Robin Sydney), Velicity (Amy Paffrath), and The Gingerdead Man (Alan Maxson and Robert Ramos) were trapped in the Bong World by Eebee (Michelle Mais). She gave them a deal that could help them escape. Larnell, Rabbit, and The Gingerdead Man would run a dispensary for one month. If they earned one million dollars, they would be freed. If not, they would be trapped in the Bong World forever.

The origins of Evil Bong: High 5 come from three separate horror series from Full Moon Features. The first was, obviously, the Evil Bong series. That was where Evil Bong: High 5 took its namesake. It was a continuation of that franchise, another sequel in a long line of sequels that will seemingly go on until the day that director/producer Charles Band dies. And, depending on who takes over the company when that day comes, perhaps even longer than that. The second series was The Gingerdead Man, a series that seemingly folded itself into the Evil Bong series after the crossover film. Finally, there was Ooga Booga, a spin-off of Doll Graveyard that somehow ended up tying into the Evil Bong franchise.

Evil Bong came out in 2006, ten years and many movies before Evil Bong: High 5. It introduced audiences to the characters they would love to watch, or love to hate-watch. There was the nerdy Alistair, the jock Brett, the surfer dude Bachman, and dropout burnout Larnell. They lived together in an apartment that would soon be terrorized by an evil bong named Eebee. (Get it? Eebee? E B? Evil Bong?) Also around were Brett’s girlfriend Luann, delivery guy Rabbit, Larnell’s gramps Cyril, and Eebee’s former owner Jimbo. These were characters that would leave a lasting impact on anyone who stuck with the series.

The Bong World was introduced in Evil Bong, though in a drastically different way than the movies that would follow. It was a strip club type of place, for the most part, that the characters’ souls would be transported to after smoking weed from Eebee. They were trapped there until Alistair figured out a way to get everyone out. If he didn’t work fast, their souls would be killed. A bunch of crossovers happened in the Bong World, as Charles Band inserted many characters from many of his other works. Jack Deth, a character from Trancers showed up, as did Ivan Burroughs, a character from Decadent Evil. There was even an appearance by The Gingerdead Man, who had premiered in his own movie a year earlier.

The most important thing about Evil Bong, however, was that it laid the groundwork for the franchise that would come from it. The characters were set up. The Bong World element was introduced. Things would change over the course of six movies, including the crossover. Some of the main characters would leave the series after three movies. Other characters would be introduced. Rabbit would move from a side character to a main character. Other bongs would be introduced, and Eebee’s Bong World would change into a jungle that featured porn star henchman that would entrance the minds of the people trapped there. Oh, and people would be completely transported to the Bong World instead of just their souls. But the essential elements of the Evil Bong movies were introduced in that first movie. People were being trapped in the Bong World after smoking weed through or provided by Ebeee.

Evil Bong wasn’t the only franchise essential to Evil Bong: High 5 being made. Another important part was The Gingerdead Man. That franchise centred around a serial killer whose soul was placed in a gingerbread man, who continued his serial killing ways. He killed in a bakery. He killed in a movie studio. He even went back in time to the 1970s and killed in a roller rink.

The first Gingerdead Man movie was the most important for Evil Bong: High 5, providing the character of The Gingerdead Man and the character of Sarah Leigh. It was the movie in which the serial killer’s spirit was transferred into the gingerbread man. Sarah Leah was one of the bakers at the bakery that he terrorized. Both characters would return for the crossover film, Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong.

The crossover came after three films in each franchise. It brought them together in a bigger way than the quick cameo crossover of the first Evil Bong film. Larnell and Sarah Leigh teamed up for a business venture and potential romance. Both Eebee and The Gingerdead Man interrupted their plans by attacking. The Gingerdead Man got trapped in the Bong World and that seemed like the end. Only it wasn’t. He would stick around in the franchise through each subsequent outing, as would Sarah Leigh. At least, she would stick around through the next two sequels.

Evil Bong 420 took place at a bowling alley and led directly into Evil Bong: High 5. It took a few characters from the Evil Bong franchise (Larnell, Rabbit, Eebee, and Velicity), and a couple characters from The Gingerdead Man (Sarah Leigh and The Gingerdead Man) and put them together for what would basically be another crossover film with the same characters as the official crossover film. The Evil Bong franchise became the Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong franchise, though with only the Evil Bong moniker.

One other tag-along in the crossover franchise that Evil Bong became was Hambo. He was a character introduced in Zombies vs. Strippers. He would subsequently appear in Ooga Booga before joining Ooga Booga in Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong, Evil Bong 420, and Evil Bong: High 5. Together, they provided comedic side-stories for what was happening with the main characters.

That meant that the franchise hadn’t become just a Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong crossover. It was a crossover of many, many Charles Band franchises. There were the three primary franchises coming together: Evil Bong, The Gingerdead Man, and Ooga Booga. Ooga Booga was a character from Doll Graveyard, which then put that movie into the same universe. The Evil Bong series had also crossed over with Zombies vs. Strippers, Trancers, and Decadent Evil. It was a wide universe that Charles Band was building with the Evil Bong series.

The origins of Evil Bong: High 5 can thusly be summed up as such. It began as an Evil Bong movie, thanks to it being the fifth (sixth, including the crossover) film in the series. It incorporated characters from The Gingerdead Man and Ooga Booga, as well, which also tied it into Doll Graveyard. And it was built on a series of movies that started with a bunch of cameo crossovers, thus tying it into a bunch of Charles Band movies. The origin of Evil Bong: High 5 was the wide world of Charles Band flicks.

Having so many crossovers throughout the Evil Bong franchise, especially leading into Evil Bong: High 5 came at the detriment of telling a good story. Too much time was taken by inserting the characters from various franchises, including the Evil Bong franchise itself, into the fifth film. The Gingerdead Man became a fully-formed character for the franchise, going through his own relationship problems, until the final moments. That was when he pulled a knife and threatened everyone, and the movie ended. Velicity and Sarah Leigh were left to be damsels in distress that Rabbit, Larnell, and The Gingerdead Man had to save. Hambo didn’t do anything to help the story. He just spent the movie interrupting scenes and trying to sell dolls based on Full Moon characters.

All that didn’t even mention the characters from the previous Evil Bong movie that didn’t add anything to the plot. They just showed up, ate up screen time, and left. There was the east Asian couple from Evil Bong 420 who showed up and waved camera gear around before leaving as abruptly. David DeCoteau showed up at the dispensary and said he was looking for his afterparty before deciding to shoot a film there and disappearing from the movie. There were the two stoners who showed up talking about having money and wanting weed, then leaving when they got weed and never being mentioned again. And then there was the hillbilly family who spent five minutes of the runtime talking weird. That was their entire point to the movie. To talk weird.

Basically, Evil Bong: High 5 ended up being a parade of characters entering and exiting the movie, with the smallest amount of actual story possible. Mind you, there was a story, so the movie was a slight step up from Evil Bong 420. Larnell, Rabbit, and The Gingerdead Man had to raise one million dollars in a month to save Velicity and Sarah Leigh. Evil Bong 420 was simply a movie about Rabbit now having a bowling alley. So, yeah, slight step up. It still wasn’t great, though.

For a direct-to-video franchise that is five (six, depending on how you look at it) movies deep, there’s not too much to complain about. The series has been on a slight upward trajectory after the abysmal Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong. And I should know what to expect out of the movies at this point. It’s not like they aren’t exactly what I’ve expected. But they could be better. They could be much better.

My introduction to Evil Bong was through a ten-movie horror box set that I had laying around the house. The name sounded intriguing, so I popped it into the schedule and gave it a look. It was the same with the second film. I found it in another box set and gave it a watch. Since then, however, I’ve been seeking them out. It could be the completionist in me, wanting to finish the franchise to say that I could. Or it could be some sort of a comfort franchise. Go back to something familiar to recapture a little bit of nostalgia for those earlier films. Or it could be the theme song. Hell, it’s probably the theme song. The theme song is pretty great. The theme song always brings me back.

Now for a few notes to finish this off:

• Evil Bong: High 5 was directed by Charles Band, who also directed Evil Bong (week 52), The Gingerdead Man (week 69), Evil Bong 2: King Bong (week 104), Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), and Evil Bong 420 (week 388).
• Robin Sydney made her eighth Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance in Evil Bong: High 5. Her other appearances were in Evil Bong (week 52), The Gingerdead Man (week 69), Evil Bong 2: King Bong (week 104), Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), Gingerdead Man 3: Saturday Night Cleaver (week 302), Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), and Evil Bong 420 (week 388).
• Mindy Robinson returned in Evil Bong: High 5. She was previously in The Coed and the Zombie Stoner (week 102), Chicks Dig Gay Guys (week 145), Samurai Cop 2: Deadly Vengeance (week 241), Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), and Evil Bong 420 (week 388).
• Jacob Witkin returned to the Evil Bong franchise in Evil Bong: High 5. He had been in Evil Bong (week 52), Evil Bong 2: King Bong (week 104), and Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), as well as Showgirls (week 170) and Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust (week 252),
• Sonny Carl Davis, John Patrick Jordan, and Michelle Mais have been in all the Evil Bong movies so far. They were in Evil Bong (week 52), Evil Bong 2: King Bong (week 104), Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), Evil Bong 420 (week 388), and Evil Bong: High 5.
• Evil Bong: High 5 saw the return of Amy Paffrath, who was in Evil Bong 2: King Bong (week 104), Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), and Evil Bong 420 (week 388).
• David DeCoteau became a three-timer this week, having appeared in Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust (week 252), Evil Bong 420 (week 388), and Evil Bong: High 5. He also directed A Talking Cat!?! (week 94).
• Evil Bong: High 5 was also the third appearance of David Del Valle, who was previously in Chopping Mall (week 306) and Evil Bong 420 (week 388).
• Circus-Szalewski was in Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong (week 271), Evil Bong 420 (week 388), and Evil Bong: High 5.
• Five actors were in Gingerdead Man vs. Evil Bong (week 347), Evil Bong 420 (week 388), and Evil Bong: High 5. They were Orson Chaplin, Jinhee Joung, Robert Ramos, Chance A. Rearden, and Tian Wang.
• Finally, there were three actors that returned from Evil Bong 420 (week 388) to appear in Evil Bong: High 5. They were Kaius Harrison, Jonathan Katz, and Rorie Moon.
• Have you seen Evil Bong: High 5? Have you seen any of the Evil Bong movies? What did you think of them? What did you think of this post? Let me know in the comments or on Twitter.
• If you catch me on Twitter of in the comments, you can always toss a suggestion my way about what I should be checking out for future Sunday “Bad” Movies posts. I’m always open to hearing about movies I might not have otherwise known about.
• Head on over to Instagram and check out Sunday “Bad” Movies for more Sunday “Bad” Movies fun.
• Next week should be just as fun as this one, if not more. I’ll be checking out a classic bad movie from 1990. It has a problematic star who was beloved at the time. He’s not so beloved now, with good reason. I’ll be checking out Ghost Dad, and I hope you’ll join me for whatever I write about that one. See you next week.