We Have A Ghost Review: A Sweet, Charming Haunted House Movie That Overstays Its Welcome

"Amblin-esque" is a term that gets thrown around a lot, and it mostly means "This movie/TV show features kids on bikes." But "We Have a Ghost," a sweet-natured family-friendly haunted house pic from "Freaky" director Christopher Landon, really has that Amblin vibe going for it. Were it not for some very modern social media-based jokes, it feels like "We Have a Ghost" could've easily fit into the late '80s and early '90s, when Steven Spielberg reigned supreme and everyone was trying to ape his style and, for lack of a better word, brand. Indeed, "We Have a Ghost" feels like the result of decades of Amblin-like pics and their various clones. It owes more than a few things to movies like "E.T.", "Poltergeist," "Beetlejuice," and even, believe it or not, the "Casper" movie from 1995. 

It's also weirdly bloated, and, like some ghosts themselves, overstays its welcome. Did this movie really need to clock in at over 2 hours? Absolutely not. But the script, penned by Landon and adapted from a short story by Geoff Manaugh, is overloaded with storylines that keep the film from being as buoyant as it should be. This isn't just a ghost story — it's a mystery, a comedy, a family film, and also a story about ... the CIA? Sure, why not? I guess?

I've grown fond of Landon's work — his two "Happy Death Day" movies are wonderful, mixing humor and horror with confidence — ditto the inventive, funny "Freaky." But "We Have a Ghost" is one of the director's weaker efforts. That's not to say this ghost story is worth busting. But it fails to pack the punch of Landon's other work. Worse, its bloated runtime is frustrating, and you'll feel every second of it as the story stretches on. Some Netflix TV shows feel like movies stretched over multiple episodes. Here's a Netflix movie that feels like a TV series crammed into a film. 

The Presley family has just moved into a big, run-down Victorian house in Chicago. It looks like the type of house you'd see on the cover of a ghost story, and that's because the house is indeed haunted — by Ernest (David Harbour), a balding spirit who can only make moans and groans (you seem to lose your voice when you die, along with some of your memories). At the start of the film, we see a family flee in terror from the haunted house, but the Presleys are different.

Kevin (Jahi Winston), the youngest son of the family, is a lonely kid who just happens to see Ernest first. Rather than run away in fear, Kevin finds Ernest's ghoulish antics amusing, and the two form an unlikely bond. You might think that Kevin will spend the rest of the movie trying to keep his new ghost buddy a secret from his family, but "We Have a Ghost" twists expectations and has all the Presleys learn about Ernest pretty quickly. Kevin's mom (Erica Ash) stresses that she doesn't want to be like every white family in every horror movie and insists they pack up and leave. However, Kevin's father Frank (Anthony Mackie) has dollar signs in his eyes. We learn that Frank has a history of failed get-rich-quick schemes, and he wants to make Ernest his latest claim to fame and fortune. Frank and Kevin's older brother (Niles Fitch) upload footage of Ernest to YouTube, and soon Ernest is going viral — resulting in a very funny sequence in which social media embraces the ghost and turns him into a celebrity. 

Harbour has a somewhat tricky role here — his character is almost entirely dialogue-free, which means the actor leans into broad, somewhat over-the-top physicality mixed with a surprising sadness that reveals it ain't easy being ectoplasm. Ernest can't remember how he died, and he's spent decades thinking he's trapped in the house unable to leave — a belief that turns out to be false as we see when Kevin and his friend Isabella (Joy Yoshino) take Ernest out into the world. 

Ernest's viral fame ends up backfiring. Soon, the CIA gets involved and plans on trapping the ghost, with a little help from skeptical, ghost-obsessed scientist Dr. Leslie Monroe (a very dry, wry Tig Notaro). The CIA angle is where "We Have a Ghost" begins to lose its way. Sure, it's likely meant as a nod to "E.T." — government agencies came after E.T. after word of the alien got out, after all. But here it often feels like a storyline ported over from a completely different movie. Worse, it feels like something that could've been completely cut from the film — there would still be plenty of conflict left to keep things going.

None of this is to say "We Have a Ghost" is without merit. It's a surprisingly sweet, frequently kind movie, and the unlikely friendship that develops between Ernest and Kevin works, and works well. Landon also gets to have fun going for a few scares — this is not a scary movie, but, like the Amblin movies of old, it's also not afraid to throw some gross, nasty stuff up on the screen to have younger viewers hiding under blankets. There are a few big laughs, too — like when Jennifer Coolidge briefly shows up as a TV medium looking to film a story on Ernest.

But "We Have a Ghost" can't escape its overstuffed nature, and that hampers the entire experience. You start to get exhausted with it all. Like a fixer-upper, there's plenty of charm here, and good bones to go with it. But there was still a lot of work left to do, too. If you grew up indoctrinated into the cult of Amblin, there's a chance you'll get a kick out of what "We Have a Ghost" has to offer. But that'll only get you so far. 

/Film Rating: 5.5 out of 10