Beetle Juice

BeetleJuice

1988

Director: Tim Burton

Writer: Michael McDowell, Larry Wilson, and Warren Skaaren

92 minutes.

Adam (Alec Baldwin) and Barbara (Genna Davis) have problems.

They die. Their house sold. And horrible people buy, trash, and move in.

Problem #1.

Their solution is to scare them away in bedsheets, though Adam and Barbara are too innocent and harmless to have any effect.

Problem #2.

Their solution is to call upon their case worker, Juno (Sylvia Sidney), for advice on how to scare, yet Adam and Barbara are passed over as lazy pranks.

Problem #3.

Finally, their solution is to call upon the bio-exorcist named…ah, don’t say it.

In the scene above, Adam and Barbara have run out of opinions and committed to using this eccentric bio-exorcist living in their town-model. Once they say his name three times, they are transformed into the model and have to dig their way to solve problem #1.

Once “the juice” is released, he begins to cause havoc on both Adam and Barbara and their horrible house guests, but Adam and Barbara can’t face their kind nature of problem #2 and now the bio-exorcist has free reign.

Juno comes back and admits their mistake is their problem, problem #3. And now their lazy pranks need to be turned into life altering situation in order to save themselves and the family they want out of their house.

They fail with Harry Belafronte’s rendition of “Day-O.”

There reason why the scene above is important is cause they wanted and needed “the juice,” but once they had him they didn’t want or need him. It goes to show they some decisions we make are foolish and not well-thought out, even when you’re dead.

The bio-exorcist causes more headache for Adam and Barbara throughout the movie before releasing pain on the horrible house guests.

In the end, they could have listened to Juno when she told them to get the people out themselves. But, then we wouldn’t have a movie. Then, the horrible guests would have never left cause all Adam and Barbara would have done is sing “Day-O.”

It goes to show, as the audience, that our need for good decisions in films (ie: listen to Juno and don’t call the bio-exorcist) is in conflict with our want for escapism (ie: the bio-exorcist causes the pain and suffering we paid to see). We make decisions to watch films and movies for escape, which is why Transformers makes money.

It’s for the escape. Not for the decisions.

And this film plays the fettle of escapism, thanks to Tim Burton. And we paid to see the juice become a snake, have hammers as hands, and almost marry the daughter, Lydia (Winona Ryder). That's why we come to see movies.

But, what was his name again?

Beetle Juice, Beetle Juice, Beetle Juice!