You'll Get a Rise Out of this Horror Comedy

(100324) The original Beetlejuice (1988) is considered a cult classic. Still, it is just an average film with a few iconic scenes. But Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is one of those rare sequels like Terminator 2, Aliens, and Top Gun 2 that outclasses the original. It’s funnier, creepier, and just as visually inventive as the first film. Although it is not strikingly original, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice does a more than adequate job of updating and deepening the characters from the first film. It gives the audience more of everything that they liked about the original movie and it’s also more consistently engaging.

So far Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has also been a decent box office success. At this writing, it is still the number one film even though it was released on September 5, and so far it has earned over $375 million. While this is not record-breaking in this increasingly post-cinema attending culture, it’s admirable that something is taking people away from their TVs and bringing them back to the theaters.

The title of the movie is a phonetic version of “Betelgeuse” which is the name of a mischievous demon who acts more like an irritating imp or elf than a lord of hell. When you say the name three times it is supposed to summon the demon which is the same way to summon the far more destructive and horrific title character from Candyman.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was directed by the king of creepy comedy, Tim Burton, who is known for his personal and idiosyncratic over-the-top visual style. Although he is obviously talented, he has never been a first-rank director like say Kubrick or Scorsese because his scripts are usually hit-and-miss.  Some of the high points of his career include Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (1985), Ed Wood (1994), Sleepy Hollow (1999), and Big Eyes (2014). His low points include the half-good Dark Shadows (2012), the terrible Planet of the Apes (2001), and the colossal box office flop, Dumbo (2019) which at least tried to be subversive.

His films always have marvelous sight gags, terrific special effects, and top-notch cinematography which is why many art students tell me he is their favorite filmmaker but the ingenuity of his scripts rarely matches the creativity of the films ‘ visual aspects and this film is no exception.

As with the first film, the cast is first rate and the film has better acting than the first one. Most of the original cast is back including Winona Ryder, Michael Keaton, and Catherine O’ Hara and they are all amusing. Catherine O’Hara comes back as the gleefully eccentric artist mom character that is somewhat similar to her role from Schitt’s Creek. In this film, she even covers her “mourning house” which she thinks is alive in black so it can heal properly.

But the film is missing some faces such as Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis, who played the charming ghost couple who have presumably ascended to a higher plane. Jeffrey Jones who played Charles Deetz is a different story and he is missing for a darker reason.  Jones was accused of possession of child porn among other things so Burton has a clever way of killing off his character twice without actually using the actor.  The film has a sequence in which a Claymation figure that resembles Jones is brutally squashed.

Like Woody Allen, Burton often casts his current romantic partners in his films. First, it was the lovely and statuesque model, Lisa Marie who had small parts in Ed Wood (1994), Mars Attacks (1996), and Sleepy Hollow (1999). Then he used the classically trained, Helena Bonham Carter in Planet of the Apes (2001), Big Fish (2003), Alice in wonderland (2010), and Dark Shadows (2012). Here, he prominently features his current beau, the Italian superstar actress, and sex symbol, Monica Bellucci as a soul-sucking succubus, Deloris. Her origin sequence is shot in black in white in Italian and it is clearly a homage to black and giallo films like Black Sunday (1960) which also features a vengeful undead villain (Italian horror queen, Barbara Steele in one of her best roles). This is Burton’s gift to film students.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is set in the present day. Lydia Deetz (the grown-up Winona Ryder who experienced a late-career resurgence with Stranger Things) looks practically the same as she did in the first film and is a delight in the film.  She has become a reality TV psychic who takes the audience into haunted houses to document supernatural mysteries, although she has become quite well off, she has a horrible boyfriend (well-played by Justin Tethered) who has proposed but he is obviously only in it for her money (All three of the main women in the Beetlejuice series seem to pick horrible men that are way below their station). Ryder has a great ability to create empathy in her audience with her often sad roles and this makes audience members wish they could help her.

In the Lydia role in the first film Rider became the undisputed Goth film queen of the 90s. Now her character has grown up and the sarcastic teen Goth mantel has been passed on to her daughter, Astrid (played winningly by Jenna Ortega of Wednesday) who thinks her mom is a flake and doubts she has any supernatural powers. Jenna’s character and the actress fit easily and naturally in the film series, and it can be argued that she is the film’s main character. Astrid meets a bad prospective boyfriend tied to the supernatural who has sinister designs on her.

The dimension of the dead entrance resembles a bureaucratic absurdist airport filled with dead people who look like they did when they died often missing parts. Beetlejuice (played again by Keaton) who is there fears a crisis.  His succubus wife (played by the comely Monica Bellucci best known as Malena) who had been chopped into pieces magically reconstitutes herself and she wants to get revenge on him for leaving her by stealing his soul.

After he is accidentally summoned by Lydia’s idiot boyfriend, Beetlejuice gets Lydia to agree to marry him so that his succubus wife won’t reclaim him in return for him helping to save her daughter from death. But Lydia has her own plans and wants to marry her selfish user boyfriend so she seems to be biding her time until she can think of a way to get out of the marriage with the demon that is no one’s idea of a dream husband.
The film has a few ingenious ideas and sight gags. The so-called soul train is a moving vehicle that brings people to the afterlife and plays nonstop funk and soul songs filled with Black Panther-era dancers, and there is even a Don Cornelius-like host. There is also a grotesquely fascinating homicidal baby featured in a splatter slapstick horror sequence that could have come out of a Sam Raimi Evil Dead film.  After seeing the scene some couples might want to use birth control or become abstinent.

Some have complained that Michael Keaton is not in the film enough and he does a long enjoyable cameo. But the film star did not want a bigger role and this is probably the film’s saving grace. While Keaton’s Beetlejuice is a marvelous, visually striking character, he is best in small doses like Austin Powers, the Coneheads, and many SNL characters. He would probably be annoying if he dominated every scene. And the other characters particularly the female ones are so charming that I never really missed him.

So, in a nutshell, although the film gets a bit violent, it is perfect for teens and families with not very young children. It’s great seasonal fun and it’s hard to imagine a better Halloween treat than Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice.  The performances are spirited and horror/comedy fans are bound to get a rise out of it. It also appears that Tim Burton’s filmmaking skill and creativity have at least temporarily been resurrected.