USA 2001
director : John Carpenter
script : Larry Sulkis, Carpenter
cinematography : Gary B Kibbe
editing : Paul Warschilka
music : Carpenter
lead actors : Natasha Henstridge, Jason Statham, Ice Cube, Pam Grier
97 minutes

Carpenter fans should make the most of Ghosts of Mars – which stiffed so badly at the US box office it might actually end his once-glorious feature-film career. But while he may not have released anything really exceptional since 1989’s terrific Prince of Darkness, neither has Carpenter made a dull movie – even if Vampires admittedly came pretty close. Ghosts may be a ramshackle throwback of a sci-fi western, but if you’re in the mood for an entertaining, undemanding slice of undemanding B-movie nonsense, look no further.

Mars, 2176. Shapely cop Ballard (Henstridge) is quizzed by her superiors after she returns to base, apparently the sole survivor of a mission to retrieve dangerous criminal ‘Desolation’ Williams (Cube) from a distant mining outpost. A series of flashbacks shows Ballard’s team arriving at the camp to discover a scene of slaughter, the colonists having been taken over by a mysterious ancient force and turned into cannibal-zombie psychopaths …

The movie is itself possessed by some powerful older spirits – the spectres of Carpenter’s own back catalogue. Buffs will have a field day ticking off the self-homages, starting with the film’s setting, exactly 200 years after Carpenter’s 1976 breakthrough Assault on Precinct 13 which also featured besieged cops, faceless villains, and a bad-ass who finally turns hero. It’s easy to knock the hole-ridden plot, the Blakes’ 7 FX, and the dated racket that is Carpenter’s own synth-metal score. But to take things at all seriously would be to miss the point: the crazily complicated flashback structure and hilarious hardboiled dialogue are all the more amusing for being played so dead-on straight. Movie of the year for teenage Marilyn Manson devotees, a guilty pleasure for the rest of us.