Ghostbusters Review

The premise is the joke and it is a very good one: paranormal catastrophe handled as pest control, with proton packs, filing cabinets, a receptionist and an unpaid loan. Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis wrote it as a much larger cosmic adventure and the trimming left a comedy about workplace deadpan, which suits the cast perfectly. Murray plays Venkman as a man who has correctly assessed that none of this is worth panicking about, and his best lines are audibly not on the page.

Ramis underplays as the technician who explains everything and reacts to nothing, and Rick Moranis contributes the most committed physical comedy in the film. Elmer Bernstein's score uses an ondes Martenot to keep a wink under the menace. The problems are structural. Sigourney Weaver's possession removes the funniest woman in the cast from the comedy, the second act runs on montage, and the Gozer finale is a shapeless effects sequence rescued only by a marshmallow punchline.