Ghosts of Mars A Movie Review	MPAA Rated - R It's 1:38 Long A Review by The Dude on the Right

The movie takes place on Mars in the future (duh?). A group of cops are being sent to pick up "Desolation" Williams (Ice Cube), being held at one of the mining outposts for some murders and a robbery. The movie opens with Lt. Ballard (Natasha Henstridge) being questioned by her superiors about what happened at the mining outpost and why she came back on an empty train. She begins to tell her tale.

Basically, her tale tells of their arrival at the mining outpost to find the place seemingly deserted. The only people who appear to be alive are those locked up in jail. Eventually, after investigating around the outpost, they stumble upon the zombie-like creatures who really don’t want our human friends around. As it turns out, these zombie-like creatures came about because of an old alien race. It seems that somehow they died out millions of years ago but their spirits were locked up in an old tomb. Well, as miners sometimes do, our miners unlocked the tomb, unleashing the alien spirits that take over the human forms of the miners. The aliens want their planet back, and since spirits can jump from one body to another if the host body dies, well, I’m thinking they’ve got a pretty good shot at getting the planet back. Sorry, I’m digressing a little.

Anyway, Ballard knows she is gonna need all the help she can get to get back to the train and leave the outpost alive, so she trusts Williams and his band of bad guys to help with the plan to get to the train. Things don’t go as well as planned and in the end Ballard is left alone on the train to bring her tales of woe and how these aliens might still be making their way to re-take Mars.

"Ghosts of Mars" is a pretty decent action flick, and if you are looking for some quality kills, decapitations, and just plain-out gore than this is a movie for you. Sure, the plot is a little weak, Natasha keeps most of her clothes on (no nudity, but a nice scene in her underwear), and Ice Cube still plays just a great bad guy with a tender side, but something was just lacking and I’m still trying to figure out exactly what. I guess the only thing I can really put my finger on are some of the dorky things that happened or were said, like Ballard’s inquiring if a big bang would accompany a nuclear explosion, that just took away from the action and suspense and snapped me back into the "Why are people in movies so stupid" mode.

I’d say catch a matinee, or this might be a good rental with your honey where she can get all squeamish and bury her head in your shoulder when people get their heads chopped off. Let’s wrap this with 2 ½ stars out of 5.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!