Made as a summer blockbuster, it brings up interesting philosophical points

Rating: 9/10 (14 August 2016)

I have to admit that Demi Moore as artist Molly and Patrick Swayze as Sam, an investment banker, had great chemistry. This was extremely popular when it came out in 1990, even winning an academy award for Whoopi Goldberg, whose career had been on a downturn up to that point.
Sam and Molly have a great life in New York City. She is an up and coming artist, he is doing well at his investment banking job. They turn part of a run down building into a yuppie paradise loft apartment. But Sam has a problem expressing his love verbally. And then Sam and Molly are mugged by a common street criminal one night while walking home. Sam is shot and killed while defending Molly, and suddenly finds himself outside of his own body. Nobody can hear him. Nobody can see him. But he can converse with other "ghosts" that he finds. He hangs out in his old apartment to be near Molly, and then something happens that makes him think his murder was not a coincidence. The guy who killed him lets himself into his apartment with a key and begins looking for something in particular. He is obviously not there to steal the television. And from there the murder mystery begins.
I still salute this movie for one inventive turn - the most unlikely protagonist ally in film history - Whoopi Goldberg as a fake psychic who turns out to be the only person who can hear Sam. She is rude, crude, at times greedy, somewhat racist and very mouthy and with a rap sheet a mile long for bunco artistry. But she does end up helping Sam, although he spends all night at her bedside singing "I'm Henry VIII I am" to get her to cooperate. However, you will like her, in part because she is so real and believable.
The philosophical questions I mentioned? I guess the biggest question raised is who is a "good" person worthy of heaven and who is a "bad" person worthy of hell? Are there mitigating circumstances? The film has both of Sam's murderers going to hell. Were they BOTH that bad? One of the killers seemed like he might have been a good person until greed tempted him to the point that he got in over his head for some quick money. He was like Fred C. Dobbs in "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" without the gold mine and the endless Mexican desert. And what about Sam? He kills two people , at first attacking them to defend others - and it has got to be scary being chased and beat up by something you can't see - but he seems to have fun scaring them to the point of frenzy. I mean, what did he think was going to happen in each case? Yet he seems surprised when they end up dead at his hands in what could be considered self defense taken to the point of revenge. Yet he goes to heaven. Maybe the scale of eternal reward doesn't weigh acts performed after death? Ponderous.
This one might seem cheesy at points, especially the pottery making/lovemaking scene, but I think it still holds up over time. I'd recommend it.