Ghostbusters 2016: Talk about the movie(s).

[Professor Zoom]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

It's the mentality of some people to call others a (-----)"ist" if they disagree with what they are saying.

And sometimes the person is just sexist and doesn't like being called out on it.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

It's the mentality of some people to call others a (-----)"ist" if they disagree with what they are saying.

And sometimes the person is just sexist and doesn't like being called out on it.

Indeed.

Also, I will reiterate that there is nothing essentially male about the concept of Ghostbusters.

 

[Kelthaz]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

It's the mentality of some people to call others a (-----)"ist" if they disagree with what they are saying. Not liking an idea doesn't equal sexist. People are happy to throw around that argument but nobody here has actually given a reason for why they think a female cast of Ghostbusters will work opposed to a mixed or an all male cast.

You're opposed to the idea of this movie entirely due to the gender of the cast and nothing else. That's the very definition of sexist. Since you hold sexist views, that makes you sexist. There's no debate here.

 

[Saul]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

I'm not entirely opposed to the gender. I am opposed to the idea that making it a female cast is fresh and original as the Director claims it is. You all jumped on the bandwagon to argue about equality for women and I agree they are not treated equally as men or represented as equally as men on screen but nobody says why they think this is a brilliant idea.

I actually do like the casting of Gillian Anderson in the movie and some other strong female leads that aren't overly sexy women being obnoxious but have range for comedy and acting. But I also don't think I 'm being cynical if I say that some of the male audience will be put off by an all female cast. That's not a sexist statement, that's just the fucking truth and the world we live in. Saying that doesn't mean I approve of it. Nor does it mean they should stop making the film because of that.

Also as I said, 51% of the audience are women and I'm not wrong in thinking that a female cast of Ghostbuster might make this more appealing than an all male cast. Is that totally wrong? If I look to comics and movies for male heroes then aren't women looking for their female counterpart? So again yes I do think this is a film aimed at women a little bit more than men this time. Am I wrong to think that at the moment more men like Ghostbusters than women? Again, is that not true?

As I have stated earlier, I am more than happy to see if I am wrong about it. I don't think it will work because instead of coming up with a good idea about how to do a sequel or a reboot the Director has basically said from the beginning that Funny women cast in this movie will make it a success. I don't think women lack anything for science fiction or fantasy films in general. I am pissy about this bright new concept which is nothing but changing the gender.

 

[Timby]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

I am pissy about this bright new concept which is nothing but changing the gender.

I'm going to try and make this as explicitly clear as possible, because I've said this before and it's gone right over your head: You. Do. Not. Know. That.

You know nothing about what Feig and Dippold have developed as a concept or what kind of take they're going to have on the movie. You seem to think they're just going to do a find-replace on the 1984 script and swap the genders, which is an utterly asinine assumption given how far out this movie is (I'll be stunned if we see it before the end of 2016).

Look at it this way: Sony / Columbia has been trying to make the movie since 1992. Aykroyd has had a script that no one liked since 1999, the Year One guys apparently crashed and burned, and I'm guessing Etan Cohen's script was no great shakes, either. One of the principals is dead and another wants nothing to do with the franchise (and make no mistake, Sony desperately wants this to be a franchise now that Spider-Man is comatose).

At that point, you essentially have two options: A "soft" reboot with Aykroyd and Hudson passing the baton, so to speak (and Aykroyd would still have creative control over any project he was involved with, throwing a massive monkey wrench into that), or a hard restart. If you're going to do a hard restart with four dudes, all it's going to get is harsh comparisons to the original -- "oh, so-and-so didn't come close to Ramis' brilliance and was a shitty Egon substitute," etc. If you take a step back, look at the thing holistically, and say, "Eh, what the hell, what about a cast of women," as it seems Feig and Dippold are doing, then I think there's at least a chance of them doing something pretty cool with the idea.

Ghostbusters 3 was never going to be good or satisfying. Aykroyd's lost the plot, Ramis didn't give a shit anymore due to his health (and who can blame him), Murray has washed his hands of the thing and Ernie Hudson just wants his paycheck. The great thing about Ghostbusters is that it wasn't a franchise -- it was a one-off happy accident of a film that miraculously came together thanks to a confluence of writing, acting, direction and effects. Sony was never going to make one last adventure with the original gang, it wanted something that was easily repeatable and sequelized.

So if you're going to go into a reboot, why not go whole hog and turn stuff on its ear? You're already in the Dark Lord's terrain, just go crazy. There's no reason to get coy.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

 

[137th Gebirg]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

I am pissy about this bright new concept which is nothing but changing the gender.

I'm going to try and make this as explicitly clear as possible, because I've said this before and it's gone right over your head: You. Do. Not. Know. That.

It's hardly a "new" concept, either. Ron Moore changed the gender (and ethnicities) of a number of primary and secondary characters. Despite the ravings of a small minority of purist TOS fans who were complaining more about the intentional breaking away from the show's roots/traditions and less about racism/sexism, I don't think NuBSG suffered at all for it. In fact, it was one of the best shows of the last decade and had the (early) ratings and an ass-ton of awards (Daytime Emmy's, Hugo's, Peabody's, etc.) to prove it.

 

[Reverend]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

Just a thought, but I wonder if they could go back Aykroyd's original batshit crazy sci-fi heavy draft and develop something from that?

Like an alternate present where the ghosts didn't just go-away after the last film/video game in the 90's and it's just become a reality of life that ghosts and demonic entities are running around New York and other PKE hotspots in the open. As a result, Ghostbusters would have become this massive franchise business, come emergency service and there's PKE forecasts and warnings on the news right along side the weather report.

IIRC the original concept was that it'd be considered more of an unpleasant, mundane job like street cleaners or pet control. The effects technology has progressed to the point where they can visualize just about anything, so it's not the hindrance it was in the early 80's.

 

[Cyke101]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

Just a thought, but I wonder if they could go back Aykroyd's original batshit crazy sci-fi heavy draft and develop something from that?

I suspect the ideas of Aykroyd's script weren't so much the problem as it could be Aykroyd himself. He always seemed far more enthusiastic about the project than any of the key players -- and who can blame him? It's his baby. But for the past decade, every time a rumor came out, it came from him, like he had TMZ and Variety on speed dial.

His GB3 script, from what I understood, woudl have been sci-fi meets Hell on Earth, which is a great concept any way you slice it. But if he insisted on being the main force, it probably would've crashed. As others pointed out, his work in the 90s wasn't so hot. And I suspect that GB2 suffers in quality compared to the first in part because Aykroyd had more control that time around. If it was Feig's idea to do a reboot, part of it, and this is just my conjecture, would be to put as much creative distance between the movie and Aykroyd as possible.

 

[Timby]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

His GB3 script, from what I understood, woudl have been sci-fi meets Hell on Earth, which is a great concept any way you slice it. But if he insisted on being the main force, it probably would've crashed.

The script that Aykroyd's been pushing since 1999 has Hell becoming over-crowded, so ghosts are coming back to Earth. So the Ghostbusters invent a device that puts them out of "phase" (as Hell is just another dimension), and they go battle Satan.

There's a reason no one but Aykroyd wanted to make it and the project kept falling apart.

As others pointed out, his work in the 90s wasn't so hot. And I suspect that GB2 suffers in quality compared to the first in part because Aykroyd had more control that time around.

Ghostbusters II suffers not from Aykroyd having creative control (he still had Ramis rewriting him), but rather two things: Schedule and the fact that no one wanted to actually do it. Ramis, Murray and Reitman had no real interest in revisiting the property. The movie didn't get made because there was a great idea screaming to be told, it happened because Columbia wanted another movie to cash in on the money it was making from the cartoon-based toys, and eventually Ramis and Reitman said, "Fine, Danny, what do you have?" And that really shows in the script, which is a beat-for-beat remake of the original. (The first montages start at 35 minutes and 39 minutes, respectively. All the other major cues -- second montage, appearance of antagonist, meeting the mayor, appearance of giant "thing", etc -- are all offset by about 10-15 minutes. It may not be minute-by-minute, but holy shit is it beat for beat.)

On the schedule side, it was just ridiculous -- it began filming in the last week of November '88, they took a break for the holidays, and picked up again in January / February, with reshoots that went well into March and possibly early April (there's a February 27, 1989, script draft which added a fair amount of stuff to prior scripts) -- and remember, they had to meet a June 16 release, hence the effects rush (both Apogee and VCE were contracted in April to do overflow work, as ILM literally could not meet the June deadline on its own). There are at least eight known script drafts between December '88 and February '89, so they were literally rewriting the movie as they were making it. No wonder Murray was so miserable (and it explains why Ramis just didn't enjoy talking about GB2 at all).

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

I know where people are coming from though. I think having female ghostbusters is not much of an issue for anyone but announcing upfront that you're going to have an all-female ghostbuster team seems gimmicky.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

^^^ I can see where that could be an issue. If they just came out and said, here are the actresses, vs. going out of their way to point out that they were doing an all-female movie. I think people in general are getting statement-weary. I know I am. Making a great movie should be the primary goal, not making socially-conscious statements about the movie. If the latter comes as a fortunate byproduct of the former, then awesome, but it shouldn't be the primary driving factor in initial announcements. It means their focus and priorities are back-asswards and need to be reviewed before the first frame gets printed.

 

[ALF]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

Just a thought, but I wonder if they could go back Aykroyd's original batshit crazy sci-fi heavy draft and develop something from that?

I suspect the ideas of Aykroyd's script weren't so much the problem as it could be Aykroyd himself. He always seemed far more enthusiastic about the project than any of the key players -- and who can blame him? It's his baby. But for the past decade, every time a rumor came out, it came from him, like he had TMZ and Variety on speed dial.

His GB3 script, from what I understood, woudl have been sci-fi meets Hell on Earth, which is a great concept any way you slice it. But if he insisted on being the main force, it probably would've crashed. As others pointed out, his work in the 90s wasn't so hot. And I suspect that GB2 suffers in quality compared to the first in part because Aykroyd had more control that time around. If it was Feig's idea to do a reboot, part of it, and this is just my conjecture, would be to put as much creative distance between the movie and Aykroyd as possible.

I don't have a link to prove it, but many believe the storyline from the successful Ghostbusters: The Video Game of 2009 closely followed ideas Dan had from an early script of the Hell-on-Earth concept. Personally I consider it to be a direct sequel of the first two films, as he had endorsed it as such.

In the game, the new villain (The Architect) attempts to tether the ghostly world to the real one, via downtown Manhattan, of course. In other words, great concept for the game but maybe not for the film. The game is still great.

As to the point about GB2, from what I've gathered, they went to shoot on day one and major changes had been made to the script, the story, much to Dan's frustration. That's what left the bad taste in Bill Murray's mouth - the studio flip flopping on key concepts to the story. I still don't mind the second movie but I find the baby (Oscar) kind of irritating. I still think GB2 needs a fan edit and cut it down to about an hour of watchable Ghostbusting.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

GB2 seemed like retread of GB.

 

[Timby]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

I don't have a link to prove it, but many believe the storyline from the successful Ghotbusters: The Video Game of 2009 closely followed ideas Dan had from an early script of the Hell-on-Earth concept. Personally I consider it to be a direct sequel of the first two films, as he had endorsed it as such.

This is untrue; the three Terminal Reality writers developed the script entirely on their own (which is why so much of it is a nostalgia trip through the first two movies and attempts to tie everything together; heck, the original drafts even had Gozer being the ultimate bad guy again). They had no notes or previous drafts to work from. Aykroyd said it was the third movie as part of the marketing material (same as the promo material saying that Aykroyd and Ramis wrote it, which they didn't).

As to the point about GB2, I believe the opposite is true. From what I've gathered, they went to shoot on day one and major changes had been made to the script, the story, much to Dan's frustration. That's what left the bad taste in Bill Murray's mouth.

The marketing department had its paws all over the design of the film (the slime blowers and Ecto-1A are ridiculously toyetic, for example, and there's some hilariously un-subtle product placement like the NES Advantage controller being used to pilot the Statue of Liberty), and there was some tonal shift mandated by the studio because of the cartoon's popularity, but no, Ramis and Aykroyd were never rewritten from on high (the studio literally could not do that, it would have been a breach of their contracts).

Edit: And in any event, that isn't how movies work. Ramis and Aykroyd were heavily involved in pre-production alongside Reitman; it isn't like they turned in their script, went home for a month and waited until they were needed to show up on the set.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

In the game, the new villain (The Architect) attempts to tether the ghostly world to the real one, via downtown Manhattan, of course. In other words, great concept for the game but maybe not for the film. The game is still great.

And the game does have great dialogue between them all, resonating with the movies, no doubt due in part to their involvement as voice actors.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Re: Aykroyd Comments on Murray, Ghostbusters 3! Working on Script w/Ra

I'm not entirely opposed to the gender. I am opposed to the idea that making it a female cast is fresh and original as the Director claims it is. You all jumped on the bandwagon to argue about equality for women and I agree they are not treated equally as men or represented as equally as men on screen but nobody says why they think this is a brilliant idea.

I'll say why it's a brilliant idea. Making it an all female cast will set it apart from the original. If it was all male and a reboot then we would be comparing Murry's Venkman to Chris Pine's or whatever.

Really wiping the slate clean gives the reboot creative space.

I actually do like the casting of Gillian Anderson in the movie and some other strong female leads that aren't overly sexy women being obnoxious but have range for comedy and acting. But I also don't think I 'm being cynical if I say that some of the male audience will be put off by an all female cast. That's not a sexist statement, that's just the fucking truth and the world we live in.

A sexist world. A sort of truth that deserves push back. So some fanboys get their genre panties in a twist because there's girls on screen? Yeah, they deserved to be called out on their sexism.

 

[Cyke101]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

GB2 seemed like retread of GB.

As Timby pointed out, it *was* a retread. Both movies even had a scene where the team is captured and incapacitated by an overreaching bureaucrat!

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

GB2 seemed like retread of GB.

As Timby pointed out, it *was* a retread. Both movies even had a scene where the team is captured and incapacitated by an overreaching bureaucrat!

Yeah, I didn't mean to dis Timby by that. I was just replying to the immediate flow of the convo in a hurry. I went back and read his post later when I had more time, and realized it looked like I was just repeating what he said.

 

[Saul]

Re: Ghostbusters reboot: We're (almost, maybe, sorta) ready to believe

http://www.blastr.com/2014-12-18/heres-title-and-cast-ghostbusters-3-could-have-been

E-mail leak of Reitman's Ghostbusters III idea before things fell apart. Nice cast list and hand off. Far better than Paul "hilarious women" Feig's plans.