Beetlejuice (1988)

 

Happy Halloween!! 

Synopsis: World’s most inept ghosts match wits with pervy spectral weirdo and nouveau riche New Yorkers with hideous taste. 1988

Blurb From the DVD jacket: “The Name in Laughter and the Hereafter” 

What Did I Learn?: 1) Live people ignore the strange and unusual. 2) The living won’t usually see the dead. 3) In Heaven there wouldn’t be dust on everything. 4) The handbook for the recently deceased reads like stereo instructions. 

You Might Like This Movie If: You want to learn about the mystery of Betelgeuse. 

Really?: 1) So, Betelgeuse (not “Beetlejuice” which is the actual title of the movie), wants to marry Lydia (Winona Ryder), even though she’s only 14? Gee, that’s a bit creepy even for a film about the supernatural. 2) I’m curious: why does Juno get so upset about Ortho getting his hands on a copy of the handbook? People have been dying since the beginning of human history, and I have to imagine that some living soul would have obtained the handbook or its predecessors before the events of this movie. 

Rating: While I have to give director Tim Burton credit for his set design and for crafting a somewhat charming and highly original black comedy, I’ve never found Beetlejuice to be all that funny (in my opinion, the often-remembered calypso dancing scene falls flat) or compelling. The film relies heavily on deliberately bad-looking special effects and moments of mayhem and doesn’t allow for much character interaction or development. The audience expects a verbal showdown between the current and previous owners of the house with Lydia as intermediary, but it never happens. 6/10 stars. 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094721/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0