Ghost Dad

Ghost Dad. 1990. Dir. Sidney Poitier. With Bill Cosby, Kimberly Russell, Denise Nicholas, Ian Bannen, Christine Ebersole, Barry Corbin, Salim Grant, Brooke Fontaine, Dakin Matthews, Dana Ashbrook, Omar Gooding. Screenplay by Phil Alden Robinson (as “Chris Reese”) and Brent Maddock & S.S. Wilson; Story by Brent Maddock & S.S. Wilson.

Badness:

Enjoyment Factor:

After the commercial and critical failure of his previous major motion picture, the amazingly awful Leonard Part 6, Bill Cosby understandably took a bit of a break from the movies, instead hiding out on his hit television program, The Cosby Show. Clearly, Cosby would learn from the mistakes the filmmakers made filming Leonard, and he would choose his next film role more carefully. Maybe he’d even get to work with a trusted friend and colleague, someone like Sidney Poitier. Yeah, the next one is going to be much better.

Three years later, Bill Cosby’s follow-up, Ghost Dad, directed by Poitier, was released. Not too surprisingly, the critics hated it and despite a decent opening weekend, it never really found audiences. Although Cosby went on to two more years of The Cosby Show and several other television programs, and a few supporting roles in some random movies, this was his final starring cinematic role. It was also Poitier’s last film as director.

In Ghost Dad, Bill Cosby plays the widower Elliot Hopper, who is trying to raise his three kids while also providing for them as a businessman. After he dies in a car accident, he must make sure his children will be taken care of, by successfully completing a deal at work by Thursday. If the plot sounds like a sitcom, that’s because it pretty much is.

Ghost Dad fails as a family film because it isn’t approachable to children and it’s really boring in several section and drags plenty. It doesn’t work as a fantasy because it doesn’t follow the rules it establishes for the afterlife; all fantasy films succeed or fail in their presentation of the world of the movie and its rules. It doesn’t work as a comedy because it isn’t funny.

That isn’t to say Cosby isn’t trying here a little harder than he was in Leonard Part 6, but he overacts and overreaches here in ways that make little sense. He also is on auto-pilot for the final half of the film. He’s best in some of the physical comedy bits, such as going to the doctor’s office…as a ghost.

It is strange that most of the plot of the film is Cosby and his kids scheming to fool his boss and co-workers that he isn’t dead. And it gets really weird in the end when his teenage daughter Diane (played by Kimberly Russell) turns into a ghost, and Ghost Dad has to convince her that “Diane, life is all there is.”

I remembered this film vaguely from childhood, and remembered how long the ending was, how it seemed to drag out from here to eternity. I was surprised of how pleasant the first few minutes of the film were, and wondered if I was wrong. It turned out I just had to wait a little. The first act sets up the bonkers second and third acts.

This is a terrible movie. The effects are not very good, although the scene where Cosby comes out of the phone to terrorize Diane’s would-be boyfriend Tony (played by Dana Ashbrook, so very 90’s in style) is great because it’s so awful. Even for fans of bad movies, Ghost Dad is a disappointment.