CASPER MEETS WENDY (1998) * Definitive proof that a film need not be lengthy in order to be painfully over-long. I guess that there's something humorous, in a malevolent way, about watching Hillary Duff wandering around in a Teletubbies suit, or dancing with an invisible cartoon ghost in a gazebo. But young Miss Duff isn't nearly the worst of it, even though she sounds exactly like the diminutive president of the Chipmunks teenybopper club. The problem, the main one, is that there's no thread of a plot to prop the special effects. The problem is that everything's stupid. You'd think that Teri Garr, Cathy Moriarty and Shelley Duvall would be good (at least interesting) witches, but they come off like a bunch of incompetent old hags, loaded up on catered crew grub in bad wigs. George Hamilton never appears even slightly interested in the proceedings (understandably enough, but if he's so powerful can't he just make himself disappear?), and he's supposed to be the villain. The best part is Richard Moll's wiseguy act, but they don't let him go on about it. Instead they go on about all kinds of utter nonsense. Scary.
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