Ghostbusters-Answer the Call, Review: Making the ghost of it

Sequel? No. Remake? Well, almost. The term going around is re-boot. Thirty years after the first ghost was busted, we have a new version, where the male protagonists are replaced by females, the female by a male, several of the original cast are invited to do cameos and the original writers/director are given all due credit It’s a joy-ride that is slow to take off, but grows on you, almost like the gargantuan balloon of a ghost that performs the dance of destruction towards the climax, uprooting skyscrapers as part of his calisthenics training in the realm of after-life. There is a moral to the story too: ghosts have highly inflated egos, so when you go out to do battle with them, all the nuclear flame-guns are fine, but don’t forget your Swiss knife.

Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) and Abby Yates (Melissa McCarthy) are a pair of authors in the wilderness, who write a book, postulating that ghosts are real, though the theory is entirely concocted and fake. A few years later, Erin lands a prestigious position at Columbia University, when her book resurfaces, for sale, on the Internet, and she is thrown out of her research position. Erin discovers that it is her co-author who has been up to mischief, and traces her to another research facility, where she is working with Jillian Holtzmann (Kate McKinnon), a nuclear scientist.

The three unite to form a ghost-hunting trio, and are soon joined by a train subway worker Patty Tolan (Leslie Jones), who has seen ghosts along the train tracks. Dumb hunk Kevin (Chris Hemworth) applies for a receptionist’s post in the team’s new office, and is hired. They discover that Rowan North (Neil Casey), a janitor gone mentally astray, has put together a contraption that harnesses huge amounts of electricity, to release ghosts, and is determined to let the gang loose in Manhattan.

Dan Akyroyd, who (co) wrote the original and has a cameo here, said in a 2013 interview with Larry King that his story for the next episode was “based on new research that’s being done in particle physics by the young men and women at Columbia University… Basically, there’s research being done that I can say that the world or the dimension that we live in, our four planes of existence, length, height, width and time, become threatened by some of the research that’s being done.” There is a particle of similarity in that idea and the form it has taken in 2016. Meanwhile, you remember the world, as it was in 1984, when big brother was watching?

Three misfit para-psychology research professors, who specialised in ghosts, Dr. Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis), Raymond Stantz (Dan Aykroyd), and Peter Venkman (Bill Murray), were kicked out of a New York City University, after their research grants were terminated. They decided they would take matters into they own hands and started a business named ‘Ghostbusters’, a "professional paranormal investigation and elimination service", out of an old firehouse. To answer distress calls, they obtained a 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor Ambulance, dubbed "Ecto-1", and hired Janine Melnitz (Annie Potts), to handle the phones and do some clerical work. Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver) comes to the Ghostbusters and asks for their help, after she experiences some horror in the kitchen of her own home.

The concept was inspired by Aykroyd's own fascination with the para-normal, and in the original story, titled Ghost Smashers, a group of Ghostbusters would travel through time, and space, hunting down huge ghosts. Back in 1984, screen credits went to Aykroyd and fellow actor, Harold Ramis.

Neither has contributed to present-day screenplay, though both, and producer-director Ivan Reitman (Czechoslovakia-born; Fathers' Day; Kindergarten Cop, Twins, Legal Eagles; now 70) are acknowledged for their first venture. Writers on this project are Katie Dippold and director Paul Feig himself. Katie had a daunting task, because she was in awe of the 1984 original, which took it time to become a kind of cult favourite, and the 1989 Part II, that was largely panned. She faced tremendous hostility as the plot was partly revealed, with social media calling the sex reversal move “gimmicky”, “patronising” and the film in danger of being “ruined by feminazis”.

If the persons who gave vent to their feelings in rather unpalatable language have seen the film, they might consider withdrawing or deleting the same. It is gender neutral when it comes to the narrative, yet, obviously, some of the sexy humour is executed from the POV of women. All four protagonists are carefully delineated, perhaps a little too carefully, to complement/contrast each other. The prologue and some of the subway scenes could have been better written. Dippold is known to believe in understatement, so maybe the apportioning for the in-the-face toilet humour and some real hitting on to males, particularly by Erin, should go to her co-writer. There was no way such a film could get a rating that allowed children to watch, which leads one to assume that the doses of adult humour might be gratis add-ons. There is even a hint of a lesbian relationship between Abby and Jillian.

After Spy, there is no guessing what prompted director Paul Feig to get Melissa McCarthy on board. Feig is also known for Bad Teacher, Bridesmaids and The Heat. Spy was fun, and so is Ghostbusters-Answer the Call. While there are a dozen films being made every year about ghosts, haunting, para-normal activity, the un-dead, zombies and other horrors, a sci-fi comedy, that takes the whole business 'on', is just what was needed to uplift the ‘spirit’ (fun intended). For the greater part, good humour abounds, like the use of an off-duty hearse as the Ghostbusters’ official car. It does all go overboard when the ghost fraternity is let loose wholesale, in an attempt to offer bang for the bucks, though.

Four women and a man do a fine job of getting their acts together, with the man Thor-oughly enjoying the self-parodying, with a frozen, moronic half-grin. Zach Woods (Tour Guide), Ed Begley Jr. (Ed Mulgrave Jr.; talk about names!), Charles Dance (Harold Filmore, a heartless boss, what else), Karan Soni (food home delivery guy), Andy Garcia (the popularity conscious mayor), Michael McDonald (the theatre manager who screams like an XXL lunged soprano), Cecily Strong (the Mayor’s Asian/Spanish looking secretary/fixer), Steve Higgins (the mean Dean), Neil Casey (Rowan North, whose mind has gone south). Now, please welcome Ozzy Osbourne, Bill Murray, Sigourney Weaver and Dan Aykroyd. They came-o, they came, and we loved ’em!

I am taking Dan Aykroyd’s taxi back home, and never mind his bad taste jokes. And no, I refuse to make any comments about Bess Rous, who plays Gertrude Aldridge’s Ghost. Why? Because an apparition told me that her part was apparently ghost-written.

Rating: ***

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3ugHP-yZXw