Beetlejuice
1988 ‘Beetle Juice’ Directed by Tim Burton
Synopsis
He's guaranteed to put some life, in your afterlife.
Thanks to an untimely demise via drowning, a young couple end up as poltergeists in their New England farmhouse, where they fail to meet the challenge of scaring away the insufferable new owners, who want to make drastic changes. In desperation, the undead newlyweds turn to an expert frightmeister, but he's got a diabolical agenda of his own.
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As someone completely sick of Tim Burton’s tired style I was a little apprehensive to revisit his earlier films; films I used to really enjoy. Thankfully, Beetlejuice, is just as entertaining as it was back in the late ‘80s and amazingly Burton’s Gothic outsider chic styling is an absolute joy here. What this and his masterpiece, Edward Scissorhands, do so well, and where his more recent films fail, is the way he juxtaposes the macabre and fantastical with the mundane and everyday.
Here the mundane is turned on its head with the ghostly figures of Adam and Barbara being the boring and normal characters of the story. It is a novel contradiction and allows for characters that would normally be…
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Because of the fact that I have only actually seen three of his films (this, Ed Wood and Batman), I generally get passed by the endless debates that rage about Tim Burton and his work and the general criticisms that are thrown at him. At the same time, having thoroughly enjoyed each of those three films, I am left in a position of wondering whether I have quite simply just been lucky enough to have seen his best ones.
Beetlejuice is actually probably my least favourite of the three, but still a film that I always enjoy. It's often forgotten that outside of Michael Keaton's admittedly brilliant but dominating title character performance that there are absolutely tonnes of great things…
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This film sits as the most puzzling, baffling, mystifying and perplexing conception I have ever had the misfortune of watching. Practicality and common sense was simply not present in this film, a very demanding grind to comprehend and appreciate this movie; I just genuinely disliked it. However I enjoyed Michael Keaton playing a deranged lunatic creating a daunting and frightening atmosphere while adding his own amusing environment. Overall disappointing, this film coming in an era where Tim Burton actually made good films, this was somewhat unsatisfactory.
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classic
looks great on blu
make-up is SO RAD
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Apparently it had been a lot longer since I'd seen this than I realized, because I had semi-forgotten large chunks of it.
It really is a pretty amazing movie. I don't think I had ever really appreciated how original and audacious and thoroughly bizarre it is. Tim Burton, with just his second full-length feature (following 1986's great absurdist fable PEE WEE'S BIG ADVENTURE) was clearly at the height of his creativity, and seems to be trying to cram in everything he ever wanted to put in a movie, and instead of seeming overloaded or like a mess, it's a beautifully tight and well-constructed film.
Such a gallery of inspired performances, too. Geena Davis and a young, boyish Alec Baldwin are…
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This one of my favorites as a kid, but later on it suffered from my being too familiar with it, so I took a few years off. It's been long enough that I have a fresh appreciation for how inventive and darkly hilarious it is - it remains the most fully realized expression of Tim Burton's wonderful imagination. Michael Keaton is outstanding, of course, but everyone in the movie is a hoot - I'm particularly fond of Catherine O'Hara's pretentious, high-strung wicked stepmother, and Winona Ryder was one of my earliest crushes before I knew what a Goth was (I just thought dressing entirely in black and being sarcastic was neat). Terrific production design, still-nifty makeup and special effects, one of Danny Elfman's best scores - Beetlejuice is a great reminder of when Tim Burton's unique style was a breath of fresh air (before it became a brand). And the last shot is still one of my favorites.
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Still remains my favourite and only Tim Burton film I own.
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When i was younger I used to watch films many, many times over, this being one of my favourites. As I have grown older I'm not usually a rewatcher of many films, unless I'm catching up on a series before seeing a new iteration or if I want to revisit a classic.
I decided I was in the mood for a comedy and had whittle my choices down to this or Dark Shadows, another Tim Burton film but one I had yet to see. I decided to go with the classic!
I love this film. Michael Keaton steals the show every moment he is on screen, which unfortunately isn't very much. Hopefully the rumours of a sequel could remedy this…
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lackluster
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I love Winona.
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This freaked me out as a kid because I didn't understand it.
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From the warped mind of Tim Burton before coming to the big league with 'Batman', this sureal and creepy comedy tells the tale of a recently deceased couple trying to scare away new tenants to their once lovley home.
As nothing works, they call in "bio-exorcist" Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton), said as 'Beetlejuice', to help them.
Full of gross and sometimes scary humour all in good taste, the path to redemption for the dead is full of classic comedy moments and great performances from a young Winona Ryder, the ever dependable Catherine O'Hara and the newley-deads Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin.
But this is Keaton's film and his crazy, larger-than-life portrayal as the fun and freaky Beetlejuice is a joy to watch over and over again.
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not great
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Fun!
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LA mamada