Haunting Of The Queen Mary

I remember back in the 80´s i used to go on a lot of cruise ships to Denmark with my family. We would make sure we had coins so we could play different slot machines. At some occations i would also play some really cool arcade games such as Double Dragon, Ninja Gaiden or Rambo as well. I also used to watch my little sister in the playing room since she was only about 4 years old where she would drive me crazy. I especially remember one of the cruise ship trips back in 1989 when we went of the bus that the travel agency had to take us to Denmark. One of the passengers walked at the end of the bus and peed on one of the tires and said:- Alright ready for another round of beers. But he would not make it very far since the cruise ship staff said he was actually too drunk to go on board, so they took him away to a drunk cell. He spent all the hours there until the ship arrived to Denmark. Imagine not even being able to get on board the ship properly and spend your day locked up. In the early 90´s we did return to the cruise ships to Denmark as well, but this time it wasn´t to play slot machines but actually do other things such as watch live performances in their night club and visit the cruise ship cinema. Speaking of cruise ships or should we say boats as well, there are several horror films that tell different stories where ships have been brought up. Some of you might think of the 2002 horror film Ghost Ship, but i actually want to talk about a completely different film called Triangle. Released in 2009 from director Christopher Smith, Triangle tells the story of a group of people who are going on a vacation in a yacht and enter a storm. They can´t go on their journey with the yacht completely destroyed, but out of nowhere comes a ship to rescue them. No one seems on boar this huge ship while they look around. What happened on this ship and why is no one there? Triangle turned out to be a great surprise to me personally. I think the mystery works pretty well and i do like the idea surrounding the mysterious ship. The acting is alright and the twists in this film is actually the most surprising part of this film, you really don´t know what is going on. Well worth checking out on streaming or rent on VOD. Speaking of ghost ships i have been curious to see a horror film released last year called Haunting Of The Queen Mary and i decided to buy myself a DVD copy from the UK ( released January 8th this year on British physical media ). Knowing that this is a film inspired by ghost stories regarding a famous ship in the late 1930´s, is this a horror film that will be enjoyed by fans of this genre or shold you throw this film into the bottom of the sea ?

One Halloween night in the year of 1938 on board the Queen Mary, passangers were brutally murdered by a passenger named David Ratch ( Wil Cobain ). Moving into present day and author Anne Calder ( Alice Eve ) visit the Queen Mary with her son Lucas Calder ( Lenny Rush ) since she is inspired to write a children´s book about the hauntings of this legendary ship while meeting her ex Patrick Calder ( Joel Fry ) who is working on this ship. Her writing process may not be as easy as she had predicted.

Haunted ships is something we don´t see a lot of in horror films every year so i am actually grateful that a film like Haunting Of The Queen Mary feels a bit different from the ordinary releases we get every year. This film does not only capture the feeling of the year of 1938, the film is also connected to present day since it goes back and forward to try and tell a story of what gruesome murders took place on board Queen Mary. Since this film is actually filmed on board the RMS Queen Mary you can actually feel the atmosphere surrounding this British ocean liner, and it is a great idea to make a horror film on board such a ship as this. I especially appreciate the scenes with the long walking halls as if it never seems to end, as if it we are all inside a big maze. This film is really brutal in some scenes and i was definetely taken by surprise by that. Usually in haunted ships they are very limited on brutal kills, but there are a few scenes in Haunting Of The Queen Mary where we get some tasteful scenes. There are a lot of characters in this film since it takes place both in the past and present day, so it would take a long time to talk about all the actors. There is no doubt that one of my favourite performances in this film comes from actor Lenny Rush as the character Lukas. Right from an early start in this film it becomes very easy to enjoy Lenny´s charming performance. I actually feel sorry for his character in one specific scene, you would have to see it to understand. Actor Will Coban as the brutal killer David is one of the highlights. Then we get an unexpected surprise such as some charming tap dance scenes between child actor Florrie Wilkinson and adult actor Wesley Alfvin that may not be horror related but i still appreciate the effort to entertain us as well. As a horror film i would say Haunting Of Queen Mary works as long as the brutality kicks in while there are a lot of dialogue scenes. We have to talk about one of the big issues that i have with this film and that is the length is over 2 hours long. That is quite a long time for a horror film and some scenes feels like they were added just to make this film longer. I believe they could have easily cut down this film 10 minutes at least and it still would have been a solid film. If you are a fan of haunting ships then you might actually appreciate this film, not only because it looks good but there are some good horror scenes as well. Director Gary Shore deliver a film that most likely fans of the ghost stories of Queen Mary will want to see, and i enjoyed this film for what it was trying to do. Looking for something to add your DVD collection on the genre of haunting films? Haunting Of Queen Mary will certainly fit well in there.

Rating: DDD

P.S. If you prefer to watch a physical copy of Haunting Of The Queen Mary, you can preorder a DVD copy at the following link on the UK release on January 22nd:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Haunting-Queen-Downie-Hudson-Alice/dp/B0CNS5FMLY