If there’s some strange in your neighborhood, who you gonna call? When there’s something weird, and it don’t look good, who you gonna call? Not Ray Parker Jr., according to this new movie. But maybe it’s progressive enough that it doesn’t matter.

I guess we are about to find out dear readers.

 

 

 

Ghostbusters (2016)

Cast: Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, Neil Casey
Director: Paul Feig
released on blu-ray October 11, 2016
******* 7/10

IMDB: 5.4
Rotten Tomatoes: 72%, Audience Score 55%
The Guardian: ****/*****

 

Paul Feig is an American actor, director, producer and screenwriter. Known for his involvement in television, Feig created Freaks and Geeks, and directed a number of episodes in other series like The Office, Arrested Development, 30 Rock, and Parks & Recreation. In 2011 he had a breakout directorial role with Bridesmaids. He has since directed The Heat, Spy, and now the Ghostbusters reboot.

Clearly pairing up with Melissa McCarthy has yielded good results for Feig.

Now that I’ve shared that bit of information, I should make it clear that the original Ghostbusters is one of my favourite movies of all time. And I struggled really hard with the idea of it being rebooted. I mean, on the surface I wanted it to succeed because of the incredible number of people who were complaining about it being a female-led reboot, but inside I didn’t because I thought the original should’ve been left alone.

Which was odd for me, because I usually don’t mind when movies get remade. Despite my inner struggle, I finally sat down and watched this movie last week. And it was pretty good.

I don’t want to give away the entire plot of this one, because I think it is a distinct enough story to warrant that protective consideration, but I will mention that the cameos are well placed, in particular the tribute to Harold Ramis at Colombia University. In fact, the gender reversal is decisive and tackles the issues throughout and without overselling the point – Which is that gender shouldn’t matter in a story, in case you’re wondering.

Pros: Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones provide standout performances as the supporting characters of the quartet, and in many ways are far more interesting to watch and take in. The callbacks with the logo, ecto-1 and firehouse are all well placed too.

Cons: Firstly, Feig isn’t as confident with CGI as one hoped, as it comes on a little heavy-handed taking you out of the story quite often. Secondly, Bill Murray’s death seems forced and unnecessary especially given that we know he wanted to “die” if another sequel came about.

Runtime: 1 hour 56 minutes

Points of Interest: The movie is dedicated to Harold Ramis. The ghost Slimer got his name from the cartoon The Real Ghostbusters, but is not named in any of the movies.

Once everything is said and done, Ghostbusters is a good comedy and worthy of the time spent on it. I think it was incredibly premature of the internet to shit all over it, and despite all of the hate spewed against it in initial trailers, these Ghostbusters answer the call.

Ray Parker Jr. wishes he would have gotten the call to return and update on his theme music, but it makes sense that the new Ghostbusters deviate from what came before, without tarnishing it. Fall Out Boy and Missy Elliott do a decent job of riffing off of the classic grammy winning theme song, and I’m not gonna argue with it’s retained catchiness. After all, Ghostbusters is one of my favourite movies of all time and I think it’s a cultural phenomenon. But that’s just a theory.

Tim!