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- Zuul redirects here. For the videogame, see Zool.
Ghostbusters (titled on-screen as Ghost Busters) is a 1984 comedy film about three eccentric New York City parapsychologists-turned-ghost exterminators. The film was released in the United States on June 8, 1984. It was produced and directed by Ivan Reitman and stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Sigourney Weaver, Annie Potts, and Ernie Hudson. With inflation adjustments, the film's original release grossed over US$500 million in the U.S., making it one of the highest grossing films of 1984 and the 31st highest grossing film of all time, domestically.
It was followed by a sequel, Ghostbusters II (1989), and two animated television series, The Real Ghostbusters (later renamed Slimer! And the Real Ghostbusters) and Extreme Ghostbusters.
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Quotations
...human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... MASS HYSTERIA!
Generally, you don't see that kind of behavior in a major appliance.
I don't have to take this kind of abuse from you. I've got hundreds of people waiting to abuse me.
I make it a rule never to get involved with possessed people. pauses Actually, it's more of a guideline than a rule...
Rarely has a movie this expensive provided so many quotable lines. — Roger Ebert
Ray, when someone asks you if you're a god, you say YES!!!
Encyclopedia
- Zuul redirects here. For the videogame, see Zool.
Ghostbusters (titled on-screen as Ghost Busters) is a 1984 comedy film about three eccentric New York City parapsychologists-turned-ghost exterminators. The film was released in the United States on June 8, 1984. It was produced and directed by Ivan Reitman and stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Sigourney Weaver, Annie Potts, and Ernie Hudson. With inflation adjustments, the film's original release grossed over US$500 million in the U.S., making it one of the highest grossing films of 1984 and the 31st highest grossing film of all time, domestically.
It was followed by a sequel, Ghostbusters II (1989), and two animated television series, The Real Ghostbusters (later renamed Slimer! And the Real Ghostbusters) and Extreme Ghostbusters. Ramis, who co-wrote the first two films, has confirmed that a script for a potential third film is being developed by Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, the writing team best known for their work on Curb Your Enthusiasm and the American version of The Office. Judd Apatow (who is co-producing the upcoming Ramis-directed The Year One) is also slated to be involved on some level. In addition, the original films' four main castmembers may have minor on-screen roles.
In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted Ghostbusters the 44th greatest comedy film of all time. The American Film Institute ranked it 28th in its list of the top 100 comedies of all time (in their "AFI's 100 Years... 100 Laughs" list). In 2005, IGN voted Ghostbusters the greatest comedy ever. In 2006, Bravo ranked Ghostbusters 76 on their "100 Funniest Movies" list. In 2009, National Review magazine ranked "Ghostbusters" number 10 on its 25 Best Conservative Movies of the Last 25 Years list.
Plot
Investigating a disturbance at the New York Public Library, three misfit parapsychology research professors specializing in research on ghosts, Drs. Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis), Raymond "Ray" Stantz (Dan Aykroyd), and Peter Venkman (Bill Murray), for the first time witness concrete evidence of paranormal activity, including a ghost. They nevertheless are expelled from Columbia University after their research grants are terminated. To maintain their livelihood, they establish "Ghostbusters", an organization described by Venkman as a "professional paranormal investigations and eliminations" service, using an old firehouse as their headquarters, a 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor Ambulance dubbed "Ecto-1" as transport, and one Janine Melnitz (Annie Potts) as a receptionist. Just as the fledgling business runs out of funds, they are hired by the staff of a hotel plagued by a ghost (named "Slimer" by Ray in The Real Ghostbusters). They capture this ghost successfully, using their nuclear-powered "proton packs" to force it into a small holding trap for later transfer to a containment grid in the firehouse. Following their first successful endeavor, the Ghostbusters suddenly find themselves overwhelmed by calls from prospective clients about hauntings, to the point that they hire a fourth member, Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson). Zeddemore ultimately comes to believe that the increase of ghostly activity is building up towards a single grand-scale paranormal event that will result in the biblical "Judgment Day", and is later proven to be correct.
Meanwhile, a woman named Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver), who lives in an apartment at 55 Central Park West, asks the team to investigate a bizarre occurrence in her kitchen. Venkman feels an immediate attraction to the woman, and sees in her request for help an opportunity to become romantically involved with her. He decides to take charge of the case and visits her apartment. He learns from Barrett that a demonic figure speaking from within her refrigerator called her by the name "Zuul", which is discovered to be the name of a (fictional) demigod worshipped in 6000 BC by the Hittites, Mesopotamians, and Sumerians as a minion of Gozer, the shape-shifting god of destruction. Venkman then asks Dana to go on a date with him. On the night of the date, Barrett is abducted by monstrous beings and put into demonic possession by a dog-like beast (see Gytrash) in her own apartment; Venkman arrives to find her in a trance, determined to locate another possessed person. At the same time, accountant Louis Tully (Rick Moranis), Barrett's neighbor, is chased down and possessed by a similar beast. He is caught by the police and brought to the Ghostbusters. Spengler recognizes that the beings possessing Barrett and Tully, Zuul ("Gatekeeper") and Vinz Clortho ("Keymaster") respectively, are seeking each other, and the team agrees to keep them apart to prevent an apocalypse from occurring.
As the ghost containment grid nears its maximum storage capacity, the Ghostbusters are visited by Walter Peck (William Atherton), a representative of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, who had previously questioned the business' safety only to be turned away by Venkman. Peck has obtained a court order by which to shut the system down; unable to stop him, the team flees the firehouse as the grid collapses and hundreds of freed ghosts flood the city. In the chaos, the possessed Tully roams free and makes his way to 55 Central Park West, while Peck has the Ghostbusters arrested. As they wait in jail, Stantz determines that this building was constructed specifically to summon Gozer, who would then destroy the world. The mayor (David Margulies) orders the release of the Ghostbusters from jail, overriding Peck's demands, and sends them to prevent the potential catastrophe.
Assisted by the police and Army, the Ghostbusters proceed to the top of 55 Central Park West, but are too late to prevent Barrett and Tully from meeting. Together they open an interdimensional portal, allowing Gozer to enter the human world, while the two are transformed into the doglike beasts seen earlier. When Gozer (Slavitza Jovan) emerges in a female humanoid form, the Ghostbusters briefly force her back into her dimension with their proton guns. Being led to believe that they are its prophesied adversaries, Gozer challenges them to choose a form for it to assume as it destroys the world. When Venkman orders his teammates to think of nothing, Stantz is unable to avoid thinking of the most innocent being he could imagine: the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. A gigantic version of this mascot appears and begins to lay waste to the city. Seeing this, Spengler realizes that their only hope is to cross their weapons' emitted energy streams, reversing the particle flow and destroying Gozer's gate to its home dimension, despite the fact that the Ghostbusters themselves may be killed as a result. As the "Marshmallow Man" reaches the top of the building, the team executes this plan, causing the gate to explode and reducing the creature to torrents of melted marshmallow. The Ghostbusters survive and Venkman frees Tully and Barrett from their doglike forms, which have been carbonized. When they leave the building, the Ghostbusters are met by Janine, who had been waiting for them. As they leave the scene in the Ecto-1, the public cheers them, followed by Slimer.
Development
The concept was inspired by Aykroyd's own fascination with the paranormal and it was conceived as a vehicle for himself and friend John Belushi, fellow Saturday Night Live alumnus. The original story, as written by Aykroyd, was very different than what was eventually filmed. In that early version, a group of Ghostbusters travelled through time, space and other dimensions taking on huge ghosts (of which the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man was just one of many). Also, the Ghostbusters wore S.W.A.T.-like outfits and used wands instead of Proton Packs to fight the ghosts. Ghostbusters storyboards show them wearing riotsquad-type helmets with movable transparent visors.
Aykroyd pitched his story to director / producer Ivan Reitman, who liked the basic idea but immediately saw the budgetary impossibilities demanded by Aykroyd's first draft. At Reitman's suggestion, the story was given a major overhaul, eventually evolving into the final screenplay which Aykroyd and Ramis hammered out over the course of three weeks in a Martha's Vineyard bomb shelter. Aykroyd and Ramis initially wrote the script with roles written especially for Belushi, Eddie Murphy and John Candy. However, Belushi died during the writing of the screenplay, and neither Murphy nor Candy would commit to the movie, so Aykroyd and Ramis shifted some of these changes around and polished a basic, yet sci-fi oriented screenplay for their final draft.
In addition to Aykroyd's high-concept basic premise, and Ramis' skill at grounding the fantastic elements with a realistic setting, the film benefits from Bill Murray's semi-improvisational performance as Peter Venkman, the character initially intended for Belushi. The extent of Murray's improvisation while delivering his lines varies wildly with every re-telling of the making of the film; some say he never even read the script, and improvised so much he deserves a writing credit, while others insist that he only improvised a few lines, and used his deadpan comic delivery to make scripted lines seem spontaneous. The Ghostbusters DVD credits Ramis' writing with nearly all of Murray's lines.
Louis Tully was originally conceived to be a conservative man in a business suit played by comedian John Candy, but with Candy unable to commit to the role, it was taken by Rick Moranis, portraying Louis as a geek. Gozer was originally going to appear in the form of Ivo Shandor as a slender, unremarkable man in a suit played by Paul Reubens. In the end, the role was played by Yugoslav model Slavitza Jovan, whose Eastern European accent (later dubbed by Paddi Edwards) caused Gozer's line of "choose and perish" to sound like "Jews and berries" to the crew's amusement.
Harold Ramis had no intention of acting in any role in the film as he planned on only helping Aykroyd write the screenplay. However, the crew struggled to cast the role of Egon Spengler, even after renowned actors such as Chevy Chase, Michael Keaton, Christopher Walken, John Lithgow, Christopher Lloyd (who eventually played another famous comedic sci-fi scientist, Doc Brown, in Back to the Future) and Jeff Goldblum (who played serious scientists in The Fly and Jurassic Park) were considered. Feeling he knew the character best since he created him, Ramis accepted the role of Egon. He credits this move in revitalizing his acting career, as Ramis basically focused on off-screen work such as writing and directing before this.
Winston Zeddemore was written with Eddie Murphy in mind, but he had to decline the role as he was filming Beverly Hills Cop at the same time. If Murphy had been cast, Zeddemore would have been hired much earlier in the film, and would've accompanied the trio on their hunt for Slimer at the hotel and be slimed in place of Peter Venkman. When Ernie Hudson took over, it was decided that he be brought in later to indicate how the Ghostbusters were struggling to keep up with the outbreak of ghosts.
In order to properly light the set for Gozer's temple and create the physical effects for the set, other stages needed to be shut down and all their power diverted over to the set. The hallway sets for the Sedgewick Hotel were originally built for the movie Rich and Famous in 1981 and patterned after the Algonquin Hotel in New York City, where Reitman originally wanted to do the hotel bust. The Biltmore Hotel was chosen because the large lobby allowed for a tracking shot of the Ghostbusters in complete gear for the first time. Dana Barrett and Louis Tully's apartments were constructed across two stages and were actually on the other side of their doors in the hallway, an unusual move in filmmaking.
A problem arose during filming when it was discovered that a show was produced in 1975 by Filmation for CBS called The Ghost Busters, starring Larry Storch and Forrest Tucker. Columbia Pictures prepared a list of alternative names just in case the rights could not be secured, but during the filming of the crowd for the final battle, the extras were all chanting "Ghostbusters", which inspired the producers to insist that the studio buy the rights to the name. This caused the cartoon series to refer to them as the "real" Ghostbusters, while the later Filmation cartoon series had the unofficial name of Filmation's Ghostbusters.
For the test screening of Ghostbusters, half of the ghost effects were missing, not yet having been completed by the production team. The audience response was still enthusiastic, and the ghost elements were completed for the official theatrical release shortly thereafter.
Cast
Dr. Peter Venkman Dan Aykroyd as Dr. Raymond Stantz Sigourney Weaver as Dana Barrett Harold Ramis as Dr. Egon Spengler Rick Moranis as Louis Tully Annie Potts as Janine Melnitz William Atherton as Walter Peck Ernie Hudson as Winston Zeddemore David Margulies as Mayor Lenny Slavitza Jovan as Gozer (voiced by Paddi Edwards) Ivan Reitman as Zuul / Slimer (voice)
Cameos
Reaction
Box office
Ghostbusters was released on June 8, 1984 in 1,339 theaters and grossed $13.6 million on its opening weekend. The film was number one at the box office for five consecutive weeks, grossing $99.8 million in that time. After seven weeks at number one, it was finally knocked to second place by Prince's film, Purple Rain and had grossed $142.6 million, second only to Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as the year's top moneymaker. However, Ghostbusters regained top spot the next week. It went on to gross $229.2 million at the box office, making it the second highest-grossing film of 1984, behind only Beverly Hills Cop. At the time, these figures put it within the top ten highest-grossing films of all-time. A re-release in 1985 gave the film a total gross of $238.6 million surpassing Beverly Hills Cop and making Ghostbusters the most successful comedy of the 1980s.
Reviews
Ghostbusters was well-received and holds a 93% Fresh Rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and wrote, "This movie is an exception to the general rule that big special effects can wreck a comedy ... Rarely has a movie this expensive provided so many quotable lines". In her review for the New York Times, Janet Maslin wrote, "Its jokes, characters and story line are as wispy as the ghosts themselves, and a good deal less substantial". Newsweek magazine's David Ansen wrote, "Everyone seems to be working toward the same goal of relaxed insanity. Ghostbusters is wonderful summer nonsense". In his review for Time, Richard Schickel praised the three lead actors: "Of the ghost wranglers, the pair played by Writers Aykroyd and Ramis are sweetly earnest about their calling, and gracious about giving the picture to their co-star Bill Murray. He obviously (and wisely) regards Dr. Peter Venkman as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to develop fully his patented comic character". Pauline Kael had problems with the chemistry between the three lead actors: "Murray is the film's comic mechanism ... But nobody else has much in the way of material, and since there's almost no give-and-take among the three men, Murray's lines fall on dead air".
Legacy
The film spawned a theme park special effects show at Universal Studios Florida. (The show closed in 1997 to make way for Twister: Ride it Out!) The Ghostbusters were also featured in a lip-synching dance show featuring Beetlejuice on the steps of the New York Public Library facade at the park after the attraction closed. The GBs were all new and "extreme" versions in the show, save for the Zeddemore character. Their Ecto-1 automobile was used to drive them around the park, and was often used in the park's annual "Macy's Holiday Parade". The show, Ecto-1, and all other Ghostbusters trademarks were discontinued in 2005 when Universal failed to renew the rights for theme park use. Currently, the Ghostbusters Firehouse can still be seen near Twister, without its GB logo and "Engine 89" ribbon. A "paranormal investigator" etching on a nearby doorway hints at the old show.
In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted Ghostbusters the 44th greatest comedy film of all time. The American Film Institute ranked it 28th in its list of the top 100 comedies of all time (in their "AFI's 100 Years... 100 Laughs" list). In 2005, IGN voted Ghostbusters the greatest comedy ever. In 2006, Bravo ranked Ghostbusters 76 on their "100 Funniest Movies" list. Entertainment Weekly ranked it as the Funniest Movie of the Past 25 Years.
NECA released a line of action figures based on the first movie but only produced a series of ghost characters, as Bill Murray refused the rights to use his facial likeness. Their first and only series included Gozer, Slimer, the Terror Dogs (Vinz Clortho and Zuul), and a massive Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man, contrasting the diminutive figure that was in the original figure line. Ertl released a die-cast 1/25 scale Ectomobile, also known as Ecto-1, the Ghostbusters' main transportation. iBooks published the novel Ghostbusters: The Return by Sholly Fisch and Rubies' Costumes has produced a Ghostbusters Halloween costume, consisting of a one-piece jumpsuit with logos and an inflatable Proton Pack.
American Film Institute recognition
Music
The film score was composed by Elmer Bernstein, notable for its use of ondes martenot (a staple of Bernstein's 1980s work) and also the Yamaha DX-7 synthesizer. Orchestrators contributing to the film were Peter Bernstein, David Spear and Patrick Russ.
The hit theme song, "Ghostbusters", written and performed by Ray Parker, Jr. sparked the catchphrases "Who you gonna call? Ghostbusters!" and "I ain't afraid of no ghost(s)". The song was a huge hit, staying #1 for three weeks on Billboard's Hot 100 chart and #1 for two weeks on the Black Singles chart. The song earned Parker an Academy Award nomination for "Best Original Song".
The music video produced for the song is considered one of the key productions of the already booming music video industry, and was a #1 MTV video. Directed by Ivan Reitman, produced by Jeffrey Abelson, and conceptualised by Keith Williams, the video integrated footage of the film in a specially designed, haunted house made entirely of neon. Film footage was intercut with a humorous performance by Parker, and featured cameo appearances by celebrities who joined in the call and response chorus, including Chevy Chase (who was considered for the role of Egon), Irene Cara, John Candy (who was considered for the role of Louis Tully), Nickolas Ashford, Melissa Gilbert, Jeffrey Tambor, George Wendt, Al Franken, Danny DeVito, Carly Simon, Peter Falk, and Teri Garr. The video ends with footage of the four main Ghostbusters actors in costume and character, dancing in Times Square behind Parker, joining in the singing.
In autumn 1984 and throughout 1985, Huey Lewis successfully sued Ray Parker, Jr. for plagiarism, citing that Parker stole the melody from his 1983 song "I Want A New Drug". Lewis had been approached to compose the main theme song for the movie, but he declined due to his work on the soundtrack for Back to the Future. It was reported in 2001 that Lewis allegedly breached an agreement not to mention the original suit, doing so on VH1's Behind the Music.
Lindsey Buckingham was also approached to do the theme song based on his success with "Holiday Road" for the National Lampoon's Vacation films. He declined, reasoning that he did not want to be known as just a soundtrack artist.
Releases
The DVD version of the movie was released and became one of the fastest selling units ever on Reel.com. Sony had announced at Comic-Con 2008 that the Blu-Ray version of the film was to be released on October 21, 2008. However, it was recently announced that the Blu-Ray will be released on June 16 (US), and 19 (EU) 2009. Ghostbusters is to be the first film ever officially released on a USB flashdrive.
Computer and video games
There are many computer and video games based on the Ghostbusters films:
Ghostbusters (Activision): a game released for the Atari Video Computer System (1984, 1985), and the Nintendo Entertainment System (1986), the 1984 Activision video game for the Atari 800, Commodore 64, Sega Master System (1987), and others. Real Ghostbusters (arcade game): a video game loosely based on the cartoon. Ghostbusters II: the 1989 Activision video game. New Ghostbusters 2: The 1990 HAL Laboratory video game Ghostbusters (Sega video game): the 1990 Sega video game. Extreme Ghostbusters: the 2001 LSP video game Extreme Ghostbusters: Code Ecto-1: the 2002 DreamCatcher video game Extreme Ghostbusters: The Ultimate Invasion: the 2004 LSP video game Ghostbusters mobile game: released for cell phones on Verizon, Sprint, Tmobile, and Cingular (now AT&T) networks, Ghostbusters: The Video Game: the June 2009 Atari video game for Windows, Xbox 360, PS2, PS3, Wii, DS, actually acting as the third installment of the series. The Game demo was in playable form at the San Diego Comic Con 2008 and at the New York Comic Con 2009.
Tie-in novelizations
There were two novelizations of the film published. The first, which came out around the same time the movie did, was written by Larry Milne and was 191 pages long. The narrative is written in the present tense, and the novel contains a behind-the-scenes section (profiling the major cast and crew members), and also the movie's complete end credits. A second novelization, written by Richard Mueller, was released in 1985. It was 65 pages longer at 256 pages, and had the extended subtitle The Supernatural Experience. Both differ from the finished version of the film in many respects, containing scenes that ultimately did not make the cut, most notably the sequence set at Fort Detmerring. Mueller's book in particular also contained a subplot involving the two homeless men played by Murray and Aykroyd in the deleted scene, who are identified as Harlan Bojay and Robert Learned Coombs.
A larger A4 sized book was also released by Hippo Books, containing a large number of stills - some from the movie, some publicity shots - tying in with the story on the relevant page. This publication is more child friendly than the previous two, and the story, while still quite extensive, is somewhat scaled down in detail.
External links
at Rotten Tomatoes
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