Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, sequel to the 1988 film, Beetlejuice, is a spooky and ghostly new film from the mind of Tim Burton. This new film takes the nostalgia from the first film and puts it into the modern day with a new story. Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, and Catherine O’Hara reprise their roles in this film, joined by new characters including Jenna Ortega, Willem Dafoe, and Justin Theroux.
The film follows Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder) and her family returning to her old home after her dad, Charles Deetz, passed away. At the house, her daughter, Astrid (Jenna Ortega), discovers she inherited her mom’s ability to see ghosts, so Lydia summons Beetlejuice to try and save Astrid. This film also introduces interesting new characters including Wolf Jackson, Delores, and Bob.
This film was written pretty well and was very skillfully directed. A lot of times when studios bring back classic films, they turn out to be a big mess or just a cash grab. Tim Burton returned to direct this film after directing the original film. In the past decade, he hasn’t been doing the best movie-wise, but Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a return to form for Burton. Starting in the 2000s, Burton used lots of CGI in his movies, including Alice in Wonderland and Dumbo. This film is heavy on practical effects, which brings the Beetlejuice nostalgia back even more. Michael Keaton perfectly brings back Beetlejuice in every way. Jeffrey Jones, who played Charles in the original film, couldn’t return, so they dealt with that in a very cool way. They killed him off, and then used a stop-motion sequence to show how he died, which was a clever idea. Winona Ryder is fantastic, just like she was in the original, and Catherine O’Hara is very funny in this film. While those are some pros, there are some cons too.
A critique of the film is that there are too many subplots. The audience can forget about a subplot or character because of some of these unnecessary things. They could have easily gotten rid of Delores, Betleguese’s ex-wife. She seems to just be there to make other things in the story work better. Throughout the whole movie, she is trying to find Beetlejuice so she can suck his soul and it is a cool build up. However, at the end, she just gets eaten by a sandworm and she’s gone. The same thing can be true for some other characters, like Lydia’s boyfriend, Rory (Justin Theroux).
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a spooky, fun, and comedic film that is perfect for the Halloween season and it might just become a new classic. At the end of the film, there is a heartfelt sequence where Astrid talks about living life and making memories with the people you love. Overall, it is a good film with funny and compelling characters, stories, and practical effects.
