Ghostbusters II
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- ''This article is about a film, it is also the title of a computer game - see Ghostbusters II (Computer game)
Taglines:
- Be ready to believe us.
- The Superstars of the Supernatural are back!
- We're back!
- The Superstars of the Supernatural are back. And this time, it's no marshmallow roast.
- Guess who's coming to save the world again?
Plot
It is five years after the events of Ghostbusters and after property destruction and "blowing off the top three floors of an uptown high-rise" (as Winston puts it), the Ghostbusters have been banned from operating as paranormal investigators. To top it off, they have been presented with a lawsuit for all the damage they caused. As a result, they have had to find other ways to make a living.
Ray Stantz and Winston Zeddemore still attempt to make a living off their past as Ghostbusters by doing special appearances at children's birthday parties. The children we see in the film seem to have forgotten what the Ghostbusters did for the City and are more interested in seeing He-Man. Ray also now owns an occult book shop. Peter Venkman has his own TV series, "World Of The Psychic", in which he ridicules people who believe they have telepathic powers. Egon Spengler, meanwhile, is a medical scientist at Johns Hopkins University. Dana Barrett and Peter Venkman never managed to stay together after Ghostbusters and she had a baby named Oscar with a musician who played in her orchestra. As well as the orchestra, Dana restores old paintings at an art museum, overseen by Dr. Janosz "Johnny" Poha. He is at work restoring a painting of Vigo the Carpathian (the scourge of Carpathia), a cruel 16th-century Moldavian ruler.
At the start of the film, Dana is taking Oscar for a walk in his baby carriage when strange pink slime rises up from a crack in the street and gets on the wheel of the carriage (unbeknownst to Dana). As a result, the carriage takes on a life of its own and tears down the street, eventually heading into oncoming traffic. The carriage stops just in time and Oscar ends up safe, but Dana is obviously disturbed by what happened. She consults Egon at the University, who examines Oscar and he recruits Stantz and Venkman to investigate what happened. Eventually, the original Ghostbusters find themselves back together and attempt to solve the mystery.
While posing as workmen, Stantz discovers a huge river of slime flowing through the ruins of Beach's Pneumatic Subway. It is eventually found out that this slime has been accumulating under New York City for decades. Stantz takes a sample of the slime for study, but the Ghostbusters are accosted by a police officer, who arrests them for disrupting traffic by drilling a huge hole in the street. The resulting chaos sees Stantz inadvertently destroy a power line, plunging the entirety of New York into a blackout.
In court, the Ghostbusters are tried by Judge Wexler for breaking the legal ban that stopped them from paranormal work. The exhibits at the trial include their proton packs and the jar of slime Stantz took for research. Because of the skepticism of Judge Wexler and the prosecuting attorney, as well as the ineptitude of their own lawyer (Louis Tully, played by Rick Moranis), the Ghostbusters lose the case. Apparently affected by the mere presence of the slime, Judge Wexler flies into a terrifying rage at the Ghostbusters (once swearing that, had he the power, he would have them "burned at the stake") and the slime uses his anger to release the vengeful ghosts of the Scoleri brothers, two murderers who Wexler had sent to the electric chair. Panicking, Wexler is compelled to remove the Ghostbusters' operating ban to let them bust the two ghosts: the Ghostbusters are back in business.
Although Venkman is still trying to rebuild his relationship with Dana, the Ghostbusters use their freedom to research the slime. They soon begin to find out what causes it to react. Spengler discovers that it is a kind of "mood slime" that feeds off of the emotions and feelings of people around it. Insults make it react violently, whereas plying it with soothing, calming words and compliments will make it settle down again. After coating the interior of a toaster with the slime and experimenting with Jackie Wilson's "Higher and Higher", they find that music makes it move and "dance". Further investigation into the river of slime beneath the city, meanwhile, reveals that the river is feeding off the bad vibes of the New Yorkers above and that it is making Janosz's painting of Vigo come to life. Vigo plans to use the slime's power to engulf the city in evil and live again.
When the Ghostbusters try to inform the mayor about the danger from the slime, he refuses to take them seriously and throws them out. To protect the mayor's image before the upcoming election, Jack Hardemeyer, the mayor's publicist, has them committed to a psychiatric ward in Parkview Hospital, classified as insane.
With the Ghostbusters imprisoned, Vigo's evil increases and New York is engulfed in supernatural chaos. Ghost sightings increase dramatically and are often spectacular, including the ghost of the Titanic completing its voyage (leading a dock worker, played by Cheech Marin, to quip, "Better late than never!") and the Mayor having a conversation with Fiorello LaGuardia (former Mayor of New York, who, at the time of the film's release, has been dead for 40 years). Eventually, it is learned why Oscar was spared from harm at the film's beginning: Vigo — using Janosz as his lackey — plans to use the baby as a new "[host]" body, planning to return to the physical plane at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve. Oscar is kidnapped by a supernaturally-empowered Janosz (who appears as a demented, ghostly English nanny complete with baby carriage) and brought back to the museum holding Vigo's painting.
On New Year's Eve, the mayhem overrunning the City eventually convinces the mayor to send for the Ghostbusters. When he finds out that Hardemeyer had them committed, he fires Hardemeyer and releases the Ghostbusters, who trek to the museum to rescue Oscar as a total eclipse of the sun occurs. But a thick dome of hardened slime has risen around the building and hardened into a shell, shutting them out of it (even their proton packs are no use). Remembering how the slime reacted to human emotion, the Ghostbusters search for a symbol of hope and purity, eventually finding it by looking at the New York State licence plate of ECTO-1: the Statue of Liberty.
The Ghostbusters enter the statue and, using modified proton packs loaded with slime, coat the statue's interior in it. Using a portable stereo, they play the slime's favourite Jackie Wilson song, "(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher" (although this time a cover performed by Howard Huntsberry) and the psychokinetic energy in the slime possesses the statue and brings it to life. Using an NES Advantage, they direct the statue to walk to the museum, accidentally crushing a police car underfoot en route and, with the help of the good feelings from the positively-inspired crowd surrounding the building, use it to smash through the slime shell and let them into the building to confront Vigo. They first take down Janosz with positively-charged slime, then proceed to face Vigo, who at this time has come out of the painting. At first, their efforts to quell Vigo's attempt to possess Oscar prove to have little effect (although Janosz is slimed and neutralized quickly), but Venkman manages to save the baby. At this point, Ray becomes possessed by Vigo instead. However, the stroke of midnight passes and with the help of the good vibes of the celebrating citizens outside, the Ghostbusters manage to force Vigo back inside his painting by coating Ray in the positively-charged slime. By shooting their slime cannons and proton beams at Vigo's weakened form inside the painting, he is destroyed forever. Ray and Janosz wake up, no longer possessed, "dripping with goo", but feeling "like a million bucks". In place of Vigo's painting is an older, apparently prophetic painting revealed by Vigo's destruction: a Renaissance-style portrayal of Oscar and the Ghostbusters in an angelic setting.
After the Ghostbusters emerge from the museum, the Mayor recognizes their efforts toward saving the city not once, but twice, reinstates them to their original positions and their business booms once again.
Cast
- Bill Murray (Dr. Peter Venkman)
- Dan Aykroyd (Dr. Raymond Stantz)
- Harold Ramis (Dr. Egon Spengler)
- Rick Moranis (Louis Tully)
- Sigourney Weaver (Dana Barrett)
- Ernie Hudson (Winston Zeddemore)
- Annie Potts (Janine Melnitz)
- Peter MacNicol (Janosz Poha)
- Wilhelm Von Homburg (Vigo the Carpathian)
Trivia
- The original Laserdisc and VHS versions of the film were made incorrectly. Instead of being produced either in the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 or panned and scanned at the aspect ratio of 1.33:1, the movie was panned and scanned in a 1.66:1 frame. Compared to the 'proper' pan and scan version at 1.33:1, width is definitely gained on the edges, though very slightly. However, the DVD version was transferred and encoded at the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1.
- There are no opening titles. The movie's title is represented by an animation of the movie's logo, but it is never displayed onscreen.
- At the end of the version shown in theaters, Slimer comes out from behind the Statue of Liberty and goes right into the camera (as he did at the end of Ghostbusters (1984)). The video version just ends with a pan up to the statue's head, then, a fade to black.
- Vigo the Carpathian is portrayed by Wilhelm von Homburg. Oscar, Dana Barrett's son, is played by the two little Deutschendorf brothers, William and Henry. Vigo is supposed to reincarnate Oscar, according to the plot, while interestingly, the fictitious 16th-century tyrant's full name, found in a computer encyclopedia by Egon, was Prince Vigo von Homburg Deutschendorf, a wordplay on the real actors' names.
- 'Van Horne Station' and the pneumatic transit system borrow inspiration from two existing sources in New York. The station itself borrows most of its design elements from the disused City Hall subway station of the original IRT. However, the station's location and the information relating to a pneumatic transit system is based on the invention of Alfred Ely Beach. Beach invented the world's first pneumatic subway system in a test tunnel beneath Broadway, the tunnel itself believed to be around 312 feet long and constructed with its own station and platform. A deleted line from the screenplay had Egon explain that the system comprised of 'fan forced air trains, built around 1870'. In further reference to this forgotten engineering marvel, the tunnel entrance from the 'Beach Subway' was adapted into the 'Van Horne' set and a sign on the stairwell (Requiring digital enhancement to detect) directing fictional passengers to Broadway (Despite the location being suggested as First Avenue and 77th Street in the film).
- A great deal of merchandise (such as coloring books) came out with the release of this film. As was the case with the Real Ghostbusters cartoon (still ongoing at the time), the makers of this material may have wanted to avoid likeness fees and as a result, the main characters in these bare little resemblance to any other version of the characters.
External links
- [Ghostbusters Prop Archive]
- [Spook Central]
- [Ghostbusters.net]
- [Proton Charging - Ghostbusters news and information]
- [Ghostbusters' Headquarters]
- [The 80's Movie Rewind]
| Ghostbusters | |
|---|---|
| Movies: | Ghostbusters | Ghostbusters II |
| Television: | The Real Ghostbusters | Extreme Ghostbusters |
| Video Games: | Ghostbusters (Activision) | Ghostbusters (Sega) | Ghostbusters II |
| Comics: | |
| Technology: | Proton pack | Ectomobile | Ghostbusters equipment |
| Characters: | Janine Melnitz | Ivo Shandor |
| Ghosts: | Slimer | Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man |
| Misc: | Filmation's Ghostbusters | Ghostbuster (term) | |
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