Ghostbusters
Some availability issues forced me to switch around some “Movie a Week” choices, but it was worth it because it gave me a great chance to revisit Ivan Reitman’s “Ghostbusters” as it turns 30. Not only does it coincide with Reitman’s latest movie hitting theatres, but it’s also a little over a month since one of the original Ghostbusters, co-writer/star Harold Ramis, shuffled off this mortal coil. Yes, some of his later films (**cough** “Year One”) weren’t quite as classic as his ’80s movies, but the world of cinematic comedy got considerably less funny when he died.
For a movie that’s a high-concept mash-up of sci-fi, horror, and comedy, it’s hard to imagine all three genres feeling fleshed out and working well together. And yet, Reitman, co-writers Ramis and Dan Aykroyd, and the actors make it look easy. It helps that the actors themselves (Ramis, Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Rick Moranis, and Annie Potts as the Ghostbusters’s put upon secretary) are comedians first, but not incapable of expressive acting, and that comedic spirit flows freely throughout the cast, with Sigourney Weaver and Ernie Hudson (as Winston Zeddemore, aka the fourth Ghostbuster) in particular bouncing off of Ramis, Aykroyd, and Murray like they’re lifelong friends.
The story is one everyone knows by now, I think. Three scientists– Egon Spangler (Ramis), Ray Stantz (Aykroyd), and Peter Venkman (Murray) –who deal with the fringes of paranormal and psychological study go into business as supernatural exterminators when their scholastic funding runs out. It’s not long until they’re media sensations, with business left and right, starting with being contacted by Weaver’s Dana Barrett, whose apartment is doing some funny things, like cooking eggs on a normal countertop. Venkman, in particular, is curious, though not for any particular scientific reasons. Unfortunately for Peter, scientific reason will need to take priority when the supernatural takes precedence, and Dana (and her neighbor, Moranis’s Louis Tully) becomes an unwitting pawn in a Sumerian God’s plan to end the world, starting with New York City. It kind of makes sense, doesn’t it?
This is one of those films that, really, all one needs to do to confirm it’s place as one of the classic movie comedies is quote one of several pieces of dialogue from any of the characters we see on screen. “Dogs and cats, living together. Mass hysteria!” “Don’t cross the streams.” “Ray, when someone asks you if you’re a god, you say, ‘Yes!'” Or you can point to the theme song by Ray Parker Jr., which is one of the great themes in movie history, to say nothing of one of the catchiest. Or you can look at the terrific visual effects supervised by Richard Edlund, and how they may have dated over the years, but have lost none of their charm and impact. (That Stay Puft Marshmellow Man at the end is still adorably terrifying, while “Slimer,” the crew’s first capture, is weirdly adorable.) And I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge the contributions by cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs and composer Elmer Bernstein, whose score is a wonderful effort that touches all of the film’s tonal bases.
Where this film’s real success lies, though, is in the convergence of comedy styles between the main characters, and the screenplay by Ramis and Aykroyd that plays this story off as not just a genre mash-up (before audiences were aware of such things) but as a work place comedy about three regular guys doing a job; the fact that ghosts and other specters are involved is almost incidental. It’s important that Ramis, Aykroyd, and Murray all had a history together before “Ghostbusters,” whether it was at Chicago’s Second City or on “Saturday Night Live” or in the film “Stripes” together. These guys know each other’s comedic strengths and styles in a way that makes them a formidable dream team. It’s definitely helped make “Ghostbusters” one of the most popular and beloved blockbusters of the past 30 years. Without these guys, I can’t imagine who we’d call if there’s something strange in the neighborhood, although from the sound of it, Hollywood may well be forcing us to do so, even with the passing of one of the original Ghostbusters. I’m not sure I’ll be able to accept that.
