FILMRECENSION - Ghostbusters 2016
So I finally got around to watching this and.. okay, yes... I got a few things to say about this one... and yes, it is mostly all bad. And yes, I will bring up the original movies for comparison.
But that's not because of any failed understanding that this latest Ghostbusters-movie is trying to do its own thing; no, its because even though it is indeed trying to be its own thing, virtually every decision with that purpose in mind STILL makes this movie so horrendously bad; despite the best of intentions.
So, pros and cons.
Lets start with the easy part. The cons.
CONS
First problem.
Rambling-humor.
Soooooooooooo much rambling-humor in this movie, it goes way overboard. There is pointless rambling for cheap kicks at every turn.
Oh, you don't know what rambling-humor is? Well then, let me explain.. I actually don't know if there is a real technical term for it (I just made up the word to have a point of reference), but rambling-humor is when characters start to ramble on about something completely unimportant and out of context while facing an obviously critical situation. Another word for it could be the "Owen Wilson-effect".
For instance, when the mayor of New York says that they need to spread the rumor that what happened at the concert was fake, the main characters suddenly shift their focus and start to debate whether or not the saying "cat's out of the bag" is a viable figure of speech... I mean, they spend so much energy and time on it, its crazy.
Rambling-humor forces out something completely random to be the object of attention in a desparate grabs for laughs through an attempt at making the immediate threat seem less intimidating only to be shocked into attendance a moment later, usually by someone less inclined to focus on such trivial matters.
Rambling-humor is something that was new and fresh and fun ten years ago, but today, its been done to death. Seriously. But this movie takes every bit of the mundane everyday-life details and have the characters bring them up in the most inappropriate situations again and again. I swear, its like every member of the team has Inattentive ADHD.
So yes, the first problem is the obvious lack of humor through the humor-less humor being provided. Period.
The second problem is the way that this movie prides itself on being pro-equality, but actually ends up being shockingly one-sided in the other direction.
Before we get to the intricate offense of one certain character in particular, I just have to bring this up.
Instead of an all-male team, Paul Feig figures we should be treated to an all-female team. Okay.. but... here is a question... why? I mean, what's wrong with a gender-mixed team? I agree that women should be treated fairly and represented equally in the entertainment industry, but why go for something that is just as extreme as the old configuration was, only in the opposite way? A gender-mixed team would have been perfect for the times, but instead they chose something that is such an obvious socially gender-based statement, it makes the sighs out of everybodys throats shake the foundation of the theatre.
In regards to the characters themselves, there is an unbalanced portrayal as well. If you think that this movie is more egalitarian than the 80s-versions, you couldn't be more wrong because it acutally comes across as more offensive towards males than anything that the original Ghostbusters-movies ever did to women.
Case in point? The secretary. My god....
He is obviously there to be eye-candy, I get it, that's the joke... if that was it, then I'd be fine with it.
But its not enough that we have to watch this totally uncalled-for sexist approach towards male secretaries (Janine was never shown in that light to begin with), he is also given an insultingly stupid persona; making him laughably (in a bad way) clueless and about as deep as a McDonalds menu. He serves no purpose other than being a pretty shell of a man; as if it is a fuck-you to all men out there, like "men are substandard characters in general and we want to make a spoof of exactly that".
Also, there is the comment that Rowan makes about the souls trying to enter the material world to destroy it being "mostly dudes".... why was that even needed in the dialogue? I mean, its like it was Paul Feig's intention to give the finger to men everywhere.
And the stupidity of the secretary actually touches on the subject of what is the third problem. The OVERALL stupidity.
Because even though he gets the worst treatment in the script bar none, the stupidity doesn't seem to be limited to the secretary.
Just about everyone the Ghostbusters meet behaves in one of two ways; either stupid or trying to be clever with little contrived wise-cracks.
Yes, the Ghostbusters are not alone in the joking-business anymore, oh no.. everybody wants to be a smartass in this movie (yes, I saw it too.. the national security agent actually makes the "I'm watching you"-gesture, all the while screaming "I'M WATCHING YOU!!, and this is after he makes his dull "try to open the car door"-routine which made me roll my eyes so hard, I could practically see the inside of my head) and it is so painful to see, that you suddenly feel like you are watching a Benny Hill-segment with CGI. Everybody is just being so .. ridiculous!!
In the original movies, they at least made a good effort to pretend that they were real city-officials, cops, dinner-guests, subway-riders... fuckin' real people!!
Yes, Walter Peck was a douche (although technically, he was right all along), but even though the limit of that movie's over-the-top acting was mainly represented by his frustrated attempts at shutting down the Ghostbusters, he still came across as a solid person with a real agenda that could have existed for real.
In the new movie, the forced jokes out of virtually every person's mouth just constantly hits you in the face and reminds you that this isn't a subtle comedy like the original movies, its a caricature of a comedy; its a completely different kind of movie which really doesn't work in its favor.
That's when many people want to bring up the "new direction"-argument, but if you truly wanted to make this new, why then are the new characters so blatantly modeled after the original ones?
I mean, the predictable token-lineup, which isn't just a veritable spoof of the original characters but also goes beyond being parodies, is almost offensive in both respects; be it as caricatures or homages.
You've got the overly-enthusiastic nerd (Abby=Ray), the quiet and even bigger nerd that constructs the gizmos and gadgets (Holtzmann=Egon), the black loud-mouth representative of the everyday-New Yorker with cringe-worthy levels of stereotypical catch-phrases (Patty=Winston) and lastly, the proper woman who seems inclined to join the others, but mostly wonders what she is doing there. (Erin=Peter, minus the attitude).
Then there is the villain.
Ah yes.. the villain. Surely they had to have come up with something extraordinary to represent the antagonist in this modern-day take on the Ghostbusters franchise??
No.
While every previous Ghostbusters-movie had a supernatural main antagonist (G1 had Gozer, a sumerian demon-god, and G2 had Vigo, the malevolent spirit of an undead sorcerer), Ghostbusters 2016 has Rowan.
From the outset, Rowan is just a whiny, spiteful human being trying to act out the clichéd fantasy of every crazed loner with a gun that has been treated poorly by society; kill them all! "Oh, yeah, there are some evil spirits in my scheme, but yes, this is mostly about my personal revenge!!" .. *YAWN*
The cameos of the original Ghostbusters-cast are cute, but nothing fancy, and they are all about as subtle as Stan Lee's appearance in all of the Marvel movies. Bill Murray tries to make his character interesting, but it only took for him to die for me to forget that he was even in the movie.
Then there are just bits and pieces of the movie that genuinely seemed to TRY to make the movie look bad without any pretense whatsoever...
Like when the Ghostbusters try to talk Rowan down (again, with rambling-humor about soup and salad), I was like "Why are you not blasting him to bits right now?? This person literally just explained to you how he was going to release hell on earth with people being ground to pulps by malevolent otherworldly beings. SHOOT HIM, FOR GOD'S SAKE!!"
Or the juvenile antics of the Rowan-posessed Kevin. Like.... the dance-number... *shivers* .. yes, it actually happened.
My god, this isn't The Mask! Lose the Cuba Pete-routine!
PROS
Pros? In THIS movie!? ..
Well, let's see... did I laugh at ANYTHING?
No.
Okay.. but didn't I giggle even a little? A snicker here or there?
Well, yes. But those occurences are easy to count:
1. The dean at the Kenneth P. Higgins Institute was funny just because he was such a complete doofus and his contrived joke about flipping the bird was actually funny.
2. The headline NOSEBUSTERS.
And I will say that the action in the battle of the last act was kind of cool.
But then comes the stupidity of the rambling-humor right back, as they immediately after saving the world go back to talking about completely irrelevant things like sandwiches and hair colors.
Its like "naah, we don't need to deal with that traumatizing event in our lives"; the events of the past days seem to be as as normal as seeing leaves on the ground during autumn.
FINAL VERDICT
This may come as a shock, but I went into this having nothing personal against the movie. And I didn't want to diss it completely without giving it a shot. Sure, I did have my reservations in regards to the all female-team (I still don't understand why a gender-mixed team is so taboo), but all-in-all, I was curious and tried to have an open mind.
But the over-saturation of forced humor is what kills it completely. With jokes upon jokes at every turn, you feel like you are drowning in bad punch-lines. It went beyond being annoying and actually ruined the movie to a large part, and thus, I can't in good conscience give this more than one Death Star out of five possible.
That's it. We have finally done it! Welcome to you, movie who has gotten the lowest score ever in one of my reviews: GHOSTBUSTERS 2016!!
Oh yeah, and Slimer has a girlfriend.
