A Film That Has Stuck With Me

Rating: Null/10 (10 February 2003)

Sam Wheat (Patrick Swayze) and Molly Jenson (Demi Moore) are a young couple living in a studio apartment in the city. But when Sam is accidentally shot while defending Molly from some thug, his desire to stay with her is so strong that his ghost remains on Earth. He tracks down the man who killed him, but can do nothing to manipulate the world around him. That is, until he meets Oda Mae Brown (Whoopi Goldberg), a con-artist/seer who can hear him speak. Sam now must enlist the help of a reluctant Oda Mae to warn Molly that the killer may come back for her as a potential witness against him.
This isn't one of the greatest films of all time, but every aspect of the film is somewhat above average. For 1990, the effects are very good, especially the shadow monsters. Bruce Joel Rubin writes an excellent and original script that manages to capture female audiences early one with the two people in love and male audiences with the murder mystery/thriller aspect. Oda Mae is also thrown in for some good comic relief.
And I like seeing Demi Moore before she became all plastic and lost that innocence she seemed to have. The cast is uniformly good, and the cameo from Vincent Schiavelli as the 'Subway Lord' is one of the best parts of the movie. It may not be for everybody, but you must give it a chance if you've never seen it.