If you recognize Christopher Landon’s name, you’re probably a big horror-comedy fan. While having been in the business for a while, his name rose to prominence after Happy Death Day became a sleeper hit. Ever since then, he’s been involved in the making of several horror-comedies, such as writing and directing Happy Death Day 2U and Freaky, as well as producing My Best Friend’s Exorcism.
We Have a Ghost is the latest horror-comedy entry from the writer-director, and unfortunately, it’s not very good. It’s not even very fun.
The movie follows a family moving into a new house, only to discover there’s a ghost in the attic, and soon both the ghost and the family become internet famous. While this premise seems ripe for a lot of zany opportunities, this film seems disinterested in exploring those opportunities, instead giving us a very by-the-numbers and predictable flick.
Happy Death Day and Freaky both felt like Landon was squeezing every comedic possibility he could out of their respective concepts, but We Have a Ghost feels tame and even bored with its own premise. Clever jokes have now been replaced with characters screaming in over-the-top ways and randomly saying weird and awkward things.
Even 1982’s Poltergeist felt like it found more humor in its haunted house premise, and that one doesn’t even have enough jokes to be considered a comedy. Maybe if the characters were more likable, this would’ve been a more entertaining watch, but We Have a Ghost suffers from an ensemble of underwritten and one-dimensional characters.
The film boasts a pretty sizable cast but none of them are given a lot to do other than recite lines in order to move the story forward. The dad’s just there to be angry and greedy, the brother’s there to be annoying to the protagonist, the friend’s there to be the sidekick and love interest, and so on.
The only character of any real note is Jennifer Coolidge as TV medium Judy Romano, but she’s only given one big scene and it’s not even a particularly funny one. Her character also isn’t very different from the characters she’s played before, like Sophie from 2 Broke Girls and Tanya from The White Lotus. Coolidge is charismatic as always, but with such little screen time, even she’s not enough to make the movie worth a watch.
There is one impressive thing about the movie, though, and that is its cinematography. The first scene alone already boasts great shot direction and fun camera work, and as the movie goes on, there are even more well-constructed shots throughout the film.
Sadly, We Have a Ghost just doesn’t have the energy or wackiness of Landon’s previous films that made him a notable name in the genre. The film also has the misfortune of being released one month after M3GAN, which many already predicted to be one of 2023’s best horror-comedies. This movie may have a ghost but what it doesn’t have is a good screenplay, resulting in a largely forgettable time.
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