Film Review: Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
Director: Tim Burton
Warner Bros. Pictures
Released: 09.06

Lock the doors, latch the windows and be afraid. Be very, very afraid. The past decade has seen a regurgitation of nearly-perfect franchises being hacked-up, pulverized into a pinkish juice and distributed to lackluster results. It’s almost like Hollywood executives are throwing darts at a list of the 100 greatest movies ever made and no matter what it lands on, they all say, “Sure, let’s go with that.” Whether a prequel, a sequel, a live-action adaptation, a “retelling”—no one is safe. Doesn’t matter if you’re the lone wolf X-Man Wolverine, the fairest of them all Snow White or even in the most certain of circumstances, the ghost with the most Beetlejuice! So here we are: standing over the open grave of the well-rested 1988 dark comedy, ready to be disturbed by a few thousand volts of the reboot electricity that is Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. With half of the original cast onboard, along with Burton’s zany vision, is it possible we’re in for a ghostly-fun time? Well, grab your trusty Handbook for the Recently Deceased and say his name three times—Hollywood is in need of a bio-exorcist STAT!

We pick up 40 years later to find Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder, Heathers, Stranger Things) who has (in her words) “sold out and got famous” as a televised paranormal hunter with her producer and exploitative boyfriend Rory (Justin Theroux, American Psycho). After receiving news of her father’s tragically comedic death from her artistic socialite stepmother Delia (Catherine O’Hara, Schitt’s Creek, Home Alone), Lydia must head back to the town of Winter River for the funeral, while mending her relationship with her estranged teenage daughter Astrid (Jenna Ortega, Wednesday, X). However, this funeral becomes a devilish home reunion when she discovers that her old home is still inhabited by the demon spector himself (Michael Keaton, Spotlight, Batman) to wreak havoc once more. 

Although this may seem like a simple plot, the lead-up and execution is an absolute clusterfuck. Each actor does an excellent job in their roles, with Keaton still being a powerhouse into his early 70s. Ryder is still an awkward, gothic comfort character and Ortega is just a natural-born, pissy pants e-girl. With all of them on screen, though, it feels convoluted trying to pay attention when everyone’s one-up-ing each other. And that’s not counting the overlapping side stories coming from every angle. We have Beetlejuice’s soul-sucking ex-fiance Delores (Monica Bellucci, Spectre, The Matrix Reloaded) coming to avenge her death, along with Astrid forming a crush for the strange neighborhood kid (Arthur Conti, House of The Dragon) who’s hiding a sinister secret. There’s also Willem Dafoe as a dead Hollywood star playing a detective of the afterlife. There’s just soooo much to take in that could’ve been spaced out in the 1989 cartoon series, not compressed sardine-style in an hour-and-a-half movie. 

One of the biggest gripes I have with this movie, though, is the slight studio adjustments made to “make sense” to modern audiences. First comes the modernization: the electric cars, the live streams, the social media activism. When certain movies use what’s popular at the time as a plot device, it makes the authenticity cheap and immediately becomes outdated. I’m not saying all modernization is screenwriting poison, but I highly doubt Lydia would be challenging spirits in a Tesla. Maybe a Cadillac Miller Hearse from the ‘50s? Lastly, studios have officially taken away all ambiguity from storytelling because of their sneaky suspicion that modern audiences can’t connect the dots. Sometimes it’s not needed! Beetlejuice was detailed as a malevolent, unstoppable force like The Joker… or Pippi Longstocking. No backstory, no clues, just existing to be chaotic and that was the beauty in it. Now, it feels almost insulting for studios to MacGyver cheap backstories because they assume the audience is too stupid to understand. If we had any questions, we would theorize in the theater lobby.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was an entertaining watch to say the least, but the freshness projected is encased in embalming fluid. I enjoyed the old cast reuniting (without Jeffery Jones, for legal reasons—thank God for that) and Burton still knows how to channel ghoulish eye-candy with practical effects, but boy, was it rough at parts. Warner Bros let Burton run rampant on this set, yet he still wanted to take control, especially when it came to their walloping ad campaign. Believe me, when Beetlejuice has his own “Hot Ones” episode, you know they’re risking it all. All being said, this movie was just an “eh” of a sequel, while Hollywood will go back to throwing darts and tarnishing another beloved classic. I heard The Goonies was next on the chopping block… –Alton Barnhart

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