Netflix 'We Have A Ghost': Christopher Landon pokes fun at social media in new movie

Paranormal Activity, Happy Death Day and Freaky writer-director Christopher Landon makes inventive horror movies, but now he's moved into a more family-friendly adventure with We Have A Ghost on Netflix, starring David Harbour, Anthony Mackie, Tig Notaro, Jennifer Coolidge and Jahi Di'Allo Winston.

Based on the short story "Ernest" by Geoff Manaugh, We Have A Ghost begins when the Presley family, which includes dad Frank (Mackie), mom Melanie (Erica Ash) and their sons Kevin (Winston) and Fulton (Niles Fitch). They move into a home in Chicago but there's something lurking in the attic. Kevin discovers a ghost, Ernest (Harbour). Documenting the interaction by taking a video on his phone, Kevin's video ends up in his father's hands who sees this as an opportunity to go viral, thrusting the family into the spotlight, and hopefully a fortune.

Ernest very rarely speaks and Kevin realizes the ghost can't remember much about his life, including how he died. So Kevin and his friend Joy (Isabella Russo) make it their mission to help jog Ernest's memories of his living life.

As more attention is put on Ernest and the Presley family, they get the attention of Dr. Leslie Monroe (Notaro), a paranormal scientist who wants to restart a previously abandoned program with the CIA to capture ghosts.

“It really was sort of exploring how this family is kind of suddenly thrust into the spotlight and how they're dealing with that,” Landon explained to Yahoo Canada. “Ultimately, it just felt like an opportunity to make a different kind of movie than what I'm known for.”

While much of the story touches on commentary around how we react to things on social media, a notable scene, a montage of reactions to the ghost, was almost cut from the movie.

“It's funny because I had written it into the script in the first draft and then at one point, I was asked to remove it for budgetary reasons,” Landon said. “Also, just because people thought, ‘Oh we don't really need it.’”

“After we did our first test screening, it became really clear that the audience was desperate to kind of get a sense that this family was really caught up in something that was much bigger than they were, and crowd shots were not enough. So I was able to slip it back in. … It was my opportunity to kind of poke fun at social media a little bit and sort of poke fun at myself, and have a laugh at how we all kind of react to things on social media in such an immediate and tribalist sort of way.”

David Harbour 'afraid' of taking on this ghost role

While the character of Ernest is quite different for David Harbour, Landon stressed that he was a "dream actor" to cast in the role.

“He's incredibly versatile, fearless, eager,” Landon said. “He relishes the challenge of something like this and he was really afraid of having to take on a role that had no dialogue."

"But he also understood why and how to pull it off. It’s a really tough role, but his emotions are so at the ready, and he can bring them to the surface so quickly, that it was the perfect fit.”

Landon also had a very clear vision of how he wanted Ernest to look, which he describes as a "kind of average, schlubby tax accountant."

“Just giving him a bowling shirt, a really bad comb over, which I also think is a product of a time gone by,” Landon said.

“Men now, today, are like no, you shave that sh-t. You don't hang on to it. But back then, men really didn't know that and they really clung to that last sort of a bit of hair youth. I thought it was such an endearing physical detail for him.”

Building a father-son bond

At the core of this story is also the father-son relationship between Kevin and Frank, and the dynamics within this family.

“Most families sort of are made up of different alliances and so I knew that I wanted Frank and Fulton to kind of be very similar, in lockstep, so that Kevin would feel kind of like a bit of an outsider in his own home,” Landon explained.

"Also, this was a great movie to really explore the complexities specifically between fathers and sons, and how often as kids we kind of look up to our parents and then as we start to get older, we start to kind of see that they're fallible, and they're human.”

One adjustment from the short story is that Landon made a point to not "vilify" the character of Frank, which allows you to be more empathetic to his decisions, where the intention is to succeed and provide for his family.