We head back to the mid-1980s by looking into the Ivan Reitman directed supernatural comedy Ghostbusters (1984). Set in New York City, New York, the film follows the ghost-catching business of three eccentric parapsychologists. The movie script was written by Dan Aykryod, Harold Ramis and Rick Moranis, each who also star in or play supporting roles in the movie.
We meet the eccentric parapsychologists, Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, and Egon Spengler, as employees with easy and undemanding work at Columbia University. Called to the New York Public Library to investigate what presents as a legitimate encounter with a ghost, the dean at the university nonetheless dismisses this notion as well as Venkman, Stantz and Spengler. The trio now needed to find new work, choosing to capture and eliminate ghosts from an old, disused firehouse that serves as their new business location. Business initially is slow. Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis portrayed Venkman, Stantz and Spengler, respectively.
The trio, with Janine Melnitz as portrayed by Annie Potts as their receptionist, cut a commercial to advertise their business. Following a bizarre paranormal experience in her apartment, cellist Dana Barrett contacts the ghostbusters with justifiable fear. This paranormal experience occurs down the hall from socially awkward neighbor Louis Tully, who makes his amorous feelings for Barrett known. Sigourney Weaver and Rick Moranis portrayed Barrett and Tully, respectively.
Contacted by Barrett, Peter Venkman inspects her apartment while failing to initiate physically intimate relations during this visit. A subsequent call to remove a glutinous apparition from the Sedgewick Hotel hotel introduces the notions of the nuclear-powered chamber to hold ghosts in their basement, the need for care when using proton pack weapons to capture ghosts, and, ultimately, a flippant bordering on deadpan style of conducting business that somehow manages to work. Supernatural activity accelerates to the point that hiring additional ghostbuster Winston Zeddemore, as portrayed by Ernie Hudson, makes sense.
With the ghostbusting business growing coupled with a suspicion of the equipment used to store the captured ghosts, Walter Peck of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) visits the headquarters of the business demanding an inspection. Venkman outright refuses. Peck, portrayed by William Atherton, gets the ghostbusters arrested. New York City mayor Lenny Clotch pulls the men out of jail, bringing the four ghostbusters to see him and the Archbishop , Gozer, and a comically big emblem of a confectionary company that isn’t in fact real. David Margulies, Tom McDermott, and a combination of Slavitza Jovan and Paddi Edwards portrayed Clotch, the archibishop and Gozer, respectively.
I have found endless joy in watching Ghostbusters as directed by Ivan Reitman, which helps me rate the movie at 4.25-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.
Matt – Wednesday, October 25, 2023
Matt Lynn Digital 