Review of The Ghost Breakers

Those expecting another comical spook fest from the team of Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard will have to wait until half way through the film before the chills start. Up until then, there is a lot of exposition which leads to obvious conclusions about where the film is going. It does start off out appropriately with a stormy night in New York where heiress Goddard is preparing to leave for Cuba and meets radio commentator Bob Hope (much subtler than he would be in the soon-to-start "Road" series with Bing Crosby) who stows away in her luggage after believing he has accidentally killed a man. Once in Cuba, the chills explode as Goddard and Hope encounter a zombie inside the haunted house Goddard has encountered. Willie Best adds subtlety to the stereotypical scaredy cat black servant, rising above Hope's supposedly funny racist jokes at his expense by appearing smarter than his employer. Anthony Quinn and Paul Lukas are also thrown in to the midst but really have nothing substantial to offer other than their name value. The first half is deadly slower than the second part, which adds more humor that doesn't depend on Hope's usual wisecracks or slapstick. The same story was done in a slightly more entertaining way, believe it or not from this reviewer, with "Scared Stiff", the 1953 version with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.