Review of The Canterville Ghost

I enjoyed the story, and the beautiful English locations used in filming, but the main American characters (especially the parents) really were annoying. The smarmy dad blustered on and on about "physics" and ignored the obvious supernatural events, and the whole family,with the exception of Neve Campbell's character, seemed more or less like the kind of obnoxious, selfish tourists that blunder all over Europe and scream at people for not speaking English. They openly mock the beliefs and legends of the inhabitants of the village (and of the people who've lived in the home for generations) and never apologize for their boorish behavior even after it's been shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that the "ghost stories" were true the entire time. They basically invade a foreign country and then trash it for not being just like home, which is the kind of cultural tantalization Americans are (in)famous for. One wonders why the smug dad doesn't demand that they tear down the house and put up a Holiday Inn and convenience store, so little respect does he show to the area and its inhabitants.

I realize when this story was written, the idea of "modern" Americans tackling the problem of a ghost must have seemed fresh and funny. Now, though, the film only highlights why so many other countries hold us in contempt. Indeed, the only sympathetic characters in the film are the ghost and the native British inhabitants; the loud, smug Americans, so arrogant that they fail to see that THEY are the deluded ones who ignore a very real ghost, come across like fingernails on a chalkboard: grating, painful, and woefully out of place.