You know how people like to talk about movies they don’t make anymore.
That’s pretty much what Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is.
The film isn’t a gift to film critics… unless you count us as people who love all kinds of movies, high and low. It’s not a brain twister. It’s not the exciting experience of the first film that was unlike anything you had seen in the cinema. It’s a simple spin on a story that returns us to the simpler pleasures of the movies 30+ years ago.
It’s been 36 years since Beetlejuice, which preceded Batman by a year. (Yes, Virginia, they made big action movies in just a year and change after finishing the previous big action movies.) So it was Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure and Beetlejuice that led to Batman, which is why people thought Guber & Peters were insane to have hired Tim Burton. But Burton’s sensibility matched up well with the more self-serious superhero genre and made for the biggest opener ever at the time.
16 other movies followed before Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. Only 7 of them would be considered, like the first Beetlejuice, to be “originals,” which included 2 each from John August and the team of Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski. Mostly, studios wanted Burton to re-imagine films that already existed successfully in other forms.
The writing team that gave us the original masterpiece of a Beetlejuice screenplay is not really working now. One has passed away (Michael McDowell) and the other one (Larry Wilson) last has a freature film credit in 2000. So this long-in-coming sequel ended up with Gough & Millar, best loved for their TV work (especially Burton’s Wednesday) and not credited with a made screenplay until 7 years after the first Burton Batman.
(Side Note: It’s kind of gross that Barry Sonnenfeld is not at least given an Exec Producer credit on Wednesday. He really is the Burton on the live-action movies and replacing him with Burton is fine… but a shame Barry doesn’t get some credit.)
When Beetlejuice was made in 1987 and 1988, there really were no major computer-created effects. The seal was torn off on those with Jurassic Park in 1993 and later in a greater scale with Spider-Man in 2002. So a big part of the joy of early Burton is that when there was some obstacle to overcome, they ramped up the creativity and made the audience do a little work.
The famous shot of Betelgeuse that goes back to the original trailer even, from behind his head, scaring people with icky creatures exploding out of his face was an in-camera effect… more suggestive of something horrible than literal. The sandworms looked like the stop-motion that they were, without apology. Yes, they added the smoke coming out of Sylvia Sydney’s neck… But I think that was mostly practical too. Eyes popping out like in a cartoon (see: Large Marge).
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a celebration of that unique thing that Beetlejuice was and is. The storyline is pretty simple, really. Lydia Deetz iz now 40something with the husband from her happier years gone and her teen daughter, Astrid, behaving like most teens… painfully embarassed by her mother, who has become famous for talking to the dead. We never really find out if the family wealth is Lydia’s parents’ or her earnings from her TV show… just that Lydia is now a public figure and it vexes her daughter, who also doesn’t believe in Lydia’s ability to talk to the dead. Lydia’s mom, Delia, is still a drama queen of epic proportions.
One of the surprise delights of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is that Burton does not abandon his old pal, Jeffrey Jones, who was cancelled in 2002 when he turned out to not only be in possession of child pornography but had solicited a 14-year-old to pose nude for him. Jones doesn’t appear in the film as such, but his presence exists in very creative ways that I loved. Some may object to even acknowledging that he still exists in the real world.
The film is a series of sequences, some very similar to sequences from the original, some incredibly fresh. Some are magical… some less so. But what a breath of fresh air throughout. Burton is still a movie magician.
There is a cameo that really delighted me… but I didn’t know it was coming, so I am not going to tell you either. It’s not Sarah Michelle Gellar, who has a near-body-double in Amy Nuttall. Always happy to be Burn Gorman, who seems like he is going to be wasted, but ends up paying off. Monica Belluci gets a standout sequence early in the film and is a grand sight throughout.
But it is the relentless creativity… the stuff that isn’t just a reference to the past, but the choice to keep adding on layers, never afraid to try something that seems out of left field… that makes this movie so much fun… repeat watching kind of fun, jumping in at any point and having a good time.
Again, it doesn’t all land as perfectly as one might like. In a way, Justin Theroux, as Lydia’s tv producer, is there replacing the entire group of sycophantic assholes in the first film… and he works as a character, but the finger-pointing at tv is never quite sharp enough to leave a wound with laughter. Dafoe is great, but his character too, a succcess in a low-end movie cop series who held onto a grenade a little too long, is repeatedly funny… but again, the satirical idea of a movie ego gone wild is not as wild as seemed like it might become.
But there is so much to enjoy here. I laughed at different levels throughout the film. Keaton is still one of the funniest people in the world. Catherine O’Hara is still an absolute killer. Winona Ryder is right there delivering what is really a more complicated performance than in the original. And Jenna Ortega could not be a better addition to the family.
And without telling you anything real, the musical numbers are better than the original. Again… what is so shockingly fresh the first time can never be made The First Time again. But it never feels like Burton is competing with himself. He is just moving down the track ahead of his story.
I wasn’t making Top 10 lists in 1988 (Here is a hastily pulled Top 12 that could change with more thought - Beetlejuice, Broadcast News, Coming To America, Dead Ringers, Die Hard, Good Morning Vietnam, Hope & Glory, Midnight Run, Running on Empty, Things Change, Tucker: The Man and His Dream, Who Framed Roger Rabbit), but Beetlejuice would have been there and this one may not be this year. But I look forward to seeing it again… and hopping in and out of it for many years to come.
Tim Burton just turned 66. And he still has skill sets that are singularly his own. He is still daring. He is still gloriously perverse. And he is still brave.
To me, unless you just don’t connect with this genre (is it a genre?), it would take a lot of work not to like this movie. Is it frash like a newborn baby? No. Is it a perfectly complex story that pays off in every way? No. However… it is as inventive and daring as movies made by most of the young filmmakers who get a chance (albeit on a smaller scale). But Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a pleasure.
Until tomorrow…
"One of the surprise delights of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is that Burton does not abandon his old pal, Jeffrey Jones, who was cancelled in 2002 when he turned out to not only be in possession of child pornography but had solicited a 14-year-old to pose nude for him. Jones doesn’t appear in the film as such, but his presence exists in very creative ways that I loved."
Personally I don't particularly find this delightful at all! Some people are perfectly deserving of being abandoned. It might be nice to reference a character from the earlier film, I guess, but honestly with someone like this I'd prefer a filmmaker to just not mention them at all.
I just can’t wait to see this. Your review makes me think it will hit all the points I was looking for from a sequel to this classic.