Let’s just drive straight into the verdict for this movie. It’s good. It’s really good. I’m not sure it’s great, as in I don’t know that it becomes a classic like the original film. But it’s a solid, excellent film that though not a comedy is nonetheless its own Ghostbusters concept we’ve never seen before. Anybody who says this is less-than-average is just being untruthful.
So with that said, the movie isn’t perfect. It needs a little more pep in its step at different places. Actors like Paul Rudd and Bill Murray need more time on screen – everything they say and do is awesome. McKenna Grace is likewise just as amazing, but she carries the entire movie. There are places where the movie isn’t as funny as I would like. But these are quibbles.
The film ultimately goes The Force Awakens route of rebooting a series through homage, reverence, and plenty of nostalgia. But unlike The Force Awakens, this one nails it. The nods are authentic to the script, the twists are genuinely surprising, and the writers love the material enough to know what audiences are there to see. This is a spoiler-free review, so I’ll let you find out exactly what that is. Make sure to stay through the entire credits. But something that I found important was that you could strip everything about Ghostbusters from this film, and it would still be a really good family drama. It reminds me of the first Captain America movie in that it exists within the IP from whence it comes, but it is its own entity. It is unlike any Ghostbusters film you’ve seen or expected. You can very much tell this is the work of a son who loves his father and the revolutionary film he once made.
I know we talk about how Ghostbusters in its original incantation is one of the greatest comedies of all time. One thing we don’t always consider is that the soundtrack and the little effects in Ghostbusters are earworms that are right up there with Star Wars and Indiana Jones for memorability. And also, why do I keep having to go to reboots or homages to eighties films for me to listen to great music integrated into a film again? Who decided that modern films would lose the excellence of the orchestral soundtracks we once enjoyed?
Ghostbusters Afterlife is a very good film. It’s not necessarily a comedy, although it will make you chuckle in places. If you’re a crier, you do need to bring a tissue to this one. There are definitely some touching moments in this film that you wouldn’t expect in a Ghostbusters movie. And if I had to give you a word that defines what this movie is, maybe I’d say “warm”. The whole movie loves its audience, it loves its source material, and it still knows how to do something very different. But it never talks down to fans of Ghostbusters or the Ghostbusters themselves.
I’m totally up for a sequel to this one. I think we’d be ready for a comedy though, and I would love to see Bill Murray, Dan Akroyd, and Ernie Hudson making fun of new Ghostbusters keeping all of us safe. Maybe they could turn those proton packs on inauthentic critics and ridiculous haters… after all, they do seem ghoulish enough.
Harold Ramis would be proud, and audiences will feel it the whole way through.
Rating:
8.5 / 10 – Excellent
