''City of Ghosts'' is a 2002 American

crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definit ...

thriller film Thriller film, also known as suspense film or suspense thriller, is a broad film genre that evokes excitement and suspense in the audience. The suspense element found in most films' plots is particularly exploited by the filmmaker in this genre ...

co-written, directed by and starring

Matt Dillon Matthew Raymond Dillon (born February 18, 1964) is an American actor. He has received various accolades, including an Oscar and Grammy nomination. Dillon made his feature film debut in '' Over the Edge'' (1979) and established himself as a te ...

, about a con artist who must go to

Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand t ...

to collect his share of money from an insurance scam. The film was made in Cambodia, in locations that include

Phnom Penh Phnom Penh (; km, ភ្នំពេញ, ) is the capital and most populous city of Cambodia. It has been the national capital since the French protectorate of Cambodia and has grown to become the nation's primate city and its economic, indus ...

and the

Bokor Hill Station Bokor Hill Station ( km, ស្ថានីយភ្នំបូកគោ, ; french: Station d'altitude de Bokor) refers to a collection of French colonial buildings constructed as a temperate mountain luxury resort and retreat for colonial reside ...

. It premiered at the

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...

in 2002, and was released in the United States on April 25, 2003.

Premise

Jimmy is a conman who has been working for an insurance company in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

that the

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...

is investigating since it cannot pay policyholder claims following a hurricane. The mastermind of the scheme and his mentor, Marvin, is in

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

. In

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...

, Jimmy learns from Joseph Kaspar, a partner in the scheme, that Marvin is in Cambodia, where he is involved in a casino scheme. The roads are not safe so a guide takes Jimmy by back trail to

. There, he hires a cyclo driver named Sok, to take him to his destination, a run-down bar and hotel owned by a Frenchman named Emile. He learns to trust the word of Sok when attempting to make contact as there are unsafe places and people. He meets an NGO worker named Sophie and dabbles in romance with her while attending a rave party at an ancient temple. Marvin turns up, but the scam he is trying to put together – involving corrupt Cambodian government officials, high-ranking military and the Russian mafia – turns out to be more risky and dangerous than was anticipated.

Cast

as Jimmy * James Caan as Marvin * Stellan Skarsgård as Joseph Kaspar * Natascha McElhone as Sophie *

Gérard Depardieu Gérard Xavier Marcel Depardieu, CQ (, , ; born 27 December 1948) is a French actor, filmmaker, businessman and vineyard owner since 1989 who is one of the most prolific thespians in film history having completed over 250 films since 1967 alm ...

as Emile * Kem Sereyvuth as Sok * Rose Byrne as Sabrina * Kyoza as Rocky * Loto as The Red Tuxedo Man * Robert Campbell as Simon * Bo Hopkins as Teddy (uncredited)

Release

Box office

Made on a budget of $17.5 million, the film only gained a limited release, and made $357,197 at the domestic box office, and a total of $1.3 million worldwide.

Critical reception

On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film holds an approval rating of 47% based on 66 reviews, with an average rating of 5.53/10. The website's critics consensus called the film "Atmospheric, but that's about it." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, the film has a weighted average score of 57 out of 100, based on 26 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews."

Soundtrack

The soundtrack for ''City of Ghosts'' features an eclectic mix of music that includes 1960s-70s Cambodian rock and roll, French pop and American pre-World War II

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

and

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

References

External links

* * * {{Rotten-tomatoes, id=city_of_ghosts, title=City of Ghosts 2002 films 2002 crime thriller films 2002 directorial debut films French-language American films Khmer-language films 2000s Russian-language films American neo-noir films Films set in Cambodia Films set in New York City Films set in Thailand Films shot in Cambodia United Artists films Films scored by Tyler Bates American crime thriller films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films