Ghostbusters
by Ivan Reitman
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Sigourney WeaverDirector: Ivan Reitman
Writer: Dan Aykroyd
Writer: Harold Ramis
Writer: Rick Moranis
Producer: Ivan Reitman
Producer: Bernie Brillstein
Producer: Joe Medjuck
Producer: Michael C. Gross
DVD: Region Code 99
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 5.1; English (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Collector's Edition, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 105 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2002-02-05
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Columbia Pictures
Movie Reviews of Ghostbusters
Movie Review: I would give it seven stars if I could. Buy It!
Summary: 5 Stars
`Ghostbusters', produced and directed by Ivan Reitman, is probably the greatest single movie effort attributable to a Saturday Night Live ensemble. The principle perps responsible for this singularly great movie are the director plus writing by SNL alum Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, plus acting by another major comic talent, SNL alum Bill Murray and great performances put out by Sigourney Weaver, Rick Moranis, and Ramis.
Like many other great comedies such as `Some Like It Hot', `Blazing Saddles', and `Animal House', this movie benefits from the excellent premise which posits that ghosts are real and just happen to be making themselves known after a long fallow period. Part of this premise is that a trio of `professional academic parapsychologists' can work out an effective method for trapping these ghosts, spirits, apparitions, and vapors without one wit of testing on a real phastasmic being.
Like `Some Like It Hot', but unlike `Blazing Saddles', writers Aykroyd and Ramis play it straight from those few premises, much like an excellent Science Fiction story by Robert Heinlein or Arthur C. Clarke. They don't play for cheap laughs in the style of Mel Brooks (not to say `Blazing Saddles' is not an immensely funny movie, just that it's writers and directors use different methods to get to the same end).
Much of the humor in the early part of the movie is generated by the struggles of our three heroes, the future Ghostbusters Murray, Aykroyd, and Ramis with the real world, beginning with the university (to all who have been in Manhattan, this will be recognized as Columbia, but Columbia allowed the moviemakers to film there if they would NOT identify the campus as Columbia) and continuing with mortgage bankers and real estate agents. At this point, Annie Potts, in a minor role, appears and adds just the right amount of counterbalance to the serious / ethereal role to be played by Sigourney Weaver.
The story does not go into too much detail on how it is an 80 year old building build to act as `spook central' on Central Park East should suddenly come to life, but questions like this don't come to mind until after the third or fourth viewing. And, this is for sure the most important criterion for whether you want to buy a DVD. Does it survive rewatching and offer new things on a second or third viewing? As someone who has seen this flick at least six or seven times, I assure you that I certainly believe it is worth rewatching. I even get the giggles when I see the license plate on the tricked up hearse which takes our heroes to their first gig, but my hearty belly laugh on first viewing is just a fond memory.
Like all great comedies, going back at least as far as Shakespeare (and probably further, but I'm not up on my Aristophanes), the humor is made just a little more powerful by adding an element of danger to the story line. In the totally realistic `Animal House', it was the threat of our frat lads being expelled to the mercies of their draft boards. As the `Ghostbusters' premise is supernatural, the writers, director, and actors need to go just a little further than usual to make the peril believable. My hunch is that on this matter, the principles really hit the ball out of the park.
For starters, the peril is built up slowly with the brief appearance of the ancient spirits in Sigourney Weaver's refrigerator just after the appearance of the first successful ghost capture which establishes the spirits as a genuine danger to corporeal beings. Even after so many viewings, I can still sense the tension when Ghostbuster Murray is reluctant to open the refrigerator where the initial sighting occurred. The visceral high point that still thrills is the psychic kidnapping of Weaver's character by the gatekeeper beast. From that point, the danger expands to grip not only our brave lads, but also all of Manhattan.
It seems as if no movie which involves some civic, political, or financial organization can get to the finish without some nominal ally throwing a monkey wrench into the works and thereby making things worse. I just wonder why the authors picked the Environmental Protection Agency as the inadvertent heavy. I guess it was easiest to use a Federal agency as the dumbbell and leave the New York City government free to be saved with a clear conscience.
Oddly enough, the last `big joke' involving the form taken by the ultimate heavy is less effective than all the business it took to get to the final reel.
For being a pre-DVD era movie, this release has a very nice collection of special features, although the only two that mean much to me are the commentary track by Reitman and Ramis and the wide screen presentation. The commentary virtually doubles the number of times one can watch the flick with pleasure.
I recall that `Ghostbusters' ranked somewhere around 25th in the AFI list of greatest comedies. I would have rated it in the top ten at least.
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