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| A strangely menacing sky catches the eye above a new batch of 'busters on this poster for Jason Reitman's Ghostbusters: Afterlife |
The Spenglers, financially exhausted single-mom Callie and her teenage offspring Phoebe and Trevor, travel to the decrepit dirt farm that her late father has left for them, - and a hidden legacy, - of ghostbusting!
Ghostbusters: Afterlife is written by Gil Kenan (Monster House (2006)) and great Quebecois filmmaker, co-writer/director by Jason Reitman (Thank You for Smoking (2005)). It is produced by his father Ivan Reitman, the producer/director of the original Ghostbusters films, Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989). The film ignores the events of Paul Feig's female reboot Ghostbusters (2016), a much-trolled flop.
Afterlife makes it its mission to bring a cinema package that is as close as possible to a ride back in time to the era of the original films' success, the 1980s, as can be imagined, both in tone, sounds, colors, designs, pace, plot elements and Rob Simonsen's (Burnt (2015)) Danny Elfmanesque score. Plot-wise it's a Goonies (1985) spin on the 'busters. It builds up for a long time and tries to establish wonder and interest in science.
Paul Rudd (The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)) and Carrie Coon (Strange Weather (2016)) are a great fit for the adult leads, but it is Mckenna Grace (Fuller House (2016-20)) as Phoebe, a girl with a comedic killer delivery and possibly a great future ahead of her, and Logan Kim as her friend and comedic sidekick Podcast (his name another throwback reference to Short Round of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) I feel sure), who steal the movie. Their fun is the best part of Afterlife, which has good eye candy VFX but no tangible reasoning behind the invasion of ghosts and ghouls except for the film being, of course, a Ghostbusters franchise entry.
The original 'busters are brought back, which wasn't strictly speaking necessary in my humble opinion, but Reitman and Co. (plus, don't forget, the studio) have elected to push the respectfulness and nostalgia that Feig's movie lacked in 2016, and it is okay. The problem with trying to evoke real wonder and characters with dramatic tangents (poverty, fitting in in a new environment and coming-of-age) is here that every line and situation is infused with an irony so thick that the former ambitions are tripped against ever hitting anything real. But there are also gems among the ironic cleverness, as Coon's motherly advice to her 12 year-old daughter towards success in the new school: "Just don't be yourself."
It's all a joke and a fantasy with Ghostbusters: Afterlife, and overlong and nonsensical as it is, it is still a good fun time at the pictures.
Related posts:
Ghostbusters franchise: Ghostbusters (2016) - Feig's reboot is the summer's light-heartedly funny, slimy major release
Ghostbusters II (1989) - Reitman's unjustifiably maligned sequel
Ghostbusters (1984) - Reitman and Co. conjure up the gleeful pomp and circumstance of the 1980s
Jason Reitman: 2018 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2018 in films - according to Film Excess
Tully (2018) - Theron delivers in Reitman/Cody's candid motherhood dramedy
Watch a trailer for the film here
Cost: 75 mil. $
Box office: 60 mil. $ and counting
= Too early to say
[Ghostbusters: Afterlife premiered 8 October (New York) and runs 125 minutes. Development of the third Ghostbusters was ongoing from the early 1990s into the 2000s and onwards, especially restrained by Bill Murray's unwillingness to participate, and from 2014 also from Harold Ramis' death, another of the four original busters. Shooting took place from July - October 2019 in New York and Alberta, Canada. The release was pushed back almost 1½ years due to the China Virus pandemic. The film opened #1 to a 44 mil. $ first weekend in North America, and is in good shape to become a theatrical success within the coming months. It still has 14 markets slated to open in November, December and January, including France, South Korea, Russia, Spain and Australia. Reitman does not have his next directing gig announced yet. Coon returns in Boston Strangler (pre-production); Rudd in The Shrink Next Door (2021, TV-series) and theatrically possibly not before Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023). Ghostbusters: Afterlife is fresh at 62 % with a 6.00/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]
What do you think of Ghostbusters: Afterlife?
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