Pay the Ghost is pretty much as mediocre or average as they come. It's not bad, it's not good. It's just there in the middle. Right in the middle.
(In Norway we have a saying that directly translates to "in the middle of the tree", that expression describes this movie perfectly. I don't know what word in English is most suitable though)
Pay the Ghost had one jump scare that definitely did the job for me. I jumped, and got that cold chill inside my chest. But that was also the only time the movie was remotely scary. Not that it is much horror anyway. It's way more thriller/drama than horror, really.
Nick Cage is usually entertaining to watch, and also here. Sara Tancredi (you know, Prison Break) does an alright job, her character is a little annoying, but that's the scripts fault. The kid, well, he's.. OK. he has a couple of lines that sound out of place, but hey.
The effects are mostly good, except a couple of small problems here and there. The story is just interesting enough for me to wanna watch it through. But like I said, the main keyword here is mediocre. Meh. Commonplace. Average. Call it what you will. There are a couple of problems with the script, doesn't seem like a whole lot of thought went into it, at least not into all of it. But that was as I expected, really.
The movie looks pretty good. I don't know the budget, but it doesn't have that low budget-feel to it. I like it when movies look, you know, at least a little expensive.
This is one of those horror movies you can watch in the evening on a Sunday or whatever, not the kind you build a movie night around, see what I mean? It's right there smack-dab in the middle.
