Despite its title, Ghost Rock is not a spook-filled musical. It’s a kung-fu western! Hey, great idea … when it was Jackie Chan’s Shanghai Noon. But starring Gary Busey? Not so much.
Perpetually carrying that kicked-by-a-horse look and what looks like a bellyful of sausage patties, Busey plays the corrupt mayor of Ghost Rock, a dusty old backlot, er, town run by crooks and outlaws. Michael Worth (Acapulco H.E.A.T.) and lovely Jenya Lano (Stealing Candy) return there after being absent for many years to settle an old score.
Adrienne Barbeau is the madam of the local whorehouse, Jeff Fahey makes a cameo and … I’m not making this sound any more inviting, am I? Some of Busey’s set-ups are shot in an entirely different film stock, so they don’t match other shot within the same scene.
Amateurish and inept, Ghost Rock has as many clichés as it does bullets fired, with all the predictability of a staged theme-park gunfight (Guy falls from second-story railing? Check!), acted with local theater types who think they’re making art. They aren’t. —Rod Lott