Hilariously Good | Review of ‘Ghostbusters’ (2016 Film)
By Cynthia Ayala
Ghostbusters starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones & Chris Hemsworth Columbia Pictures Image Credit: ScreenRant
Following a ghost invasion of Manhattan, paranormal enthusiasts Erin Gilbert and Abby Yates, nuclear engineer Jillian Holtzmann, and subway worker Patty Tolan band together to stop the otherworldly threat.
—IMDB
Now I know that there has been so much stupid controversy over this film but let me just say this: all of that is utterly stupid. I’ve seen the original, I love the original, and to be quite frank, while this movie may be a reboot with an all-female cast, it’s hilarious. These women are funny, they have the right chemistry with one another and they bring their own creativity to this film. These actresses are not trying to be the original cast, while their parts may mirror the original cast, they bring something new to the characters, something new to the Ghostbusters franchise. Even Chris Hemsworth‘s character is different than the original Annie Potts character from the original. They are very different because the actors are being themselves, they are bringing their own unique hilarity to the film rather than rehash what was already done spectacularly, and in my book, that’s awesome.
Too many reboots/remakes make the same mistake of just redoing the movie shot by shot. Look at Psycho and The Omen. Both of those movies were redone with no originality, they just remake the movie with updated special effects (if needed) and redo the whole movie exactly like the original, shot for shot. Why bother remaking it at all then if no one is going to do anything different? This film stepped away from that and gave the story new characters with new motivations and a new villain. The story also kept the humor and paid homage to the original in several hilarious ways.
The writers knew what they were doing here. They created a hilarious film for a new generation of viewers, and it doesn’t slam on the original. This film had everything that made the original great with it’s own charm to it. At the end of the day, it was hilarious.
Admittedly this was a CGI-heavy film but that didn’t allow the story to be lost, and it wasn’t a complex story either, it was simple. They didn’t try to hard and instead left it up to the actors to deliver the film the way it should be delivered, and these actors, they didn’t fail.
McCarthy, Wiig, McKinnon, and Jones were perfect. These actresses were hilarious! They left me and the theater I was in, laughing almost non-stop. Even Hemsworth, he was great, I loved him in this movie playing the adorable idiot. He was perfect, he played that part perfectly.
Honestly, give this movie a chance because it deserves it and deserves a sequel. It left me wanting one. (★★★☆ | A+)
