Spaceballs (1987)

Director: Mel Brooks

Cast: Mel Brooks, John Candy, Rick Moranis, Bill Pullman

Have I Seen it Before: Yeah. And I’ve never really cared for it. While the majority of the human race immediately proceeds to tune out of this website forever, let me say that I’ve always liked some of his other movies—chiefly Young Frankenstein (1974)—far more.

Did I Like It: But this time was going to be different! Perhaps I’m too precious about the science fiction genre to see it spoofed. I managed to even find flaws with Galaxy Quest (1999) when everyone else on the planet thinks it’s the best thing since 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). I’m fully willing to admit that I may be the problem, and if I can just get out of my own head, I’ll enjoy the film as much as you do.

No such luck.

The film just doesn’t work for me. Many of the film’s Brooks mocks in his work are timeless, even if they are very much part of the age they were made in. Every time “Spaceballs” by the Spinners is needle dropped in the third act, it is impossible to think of this film as anything other than something made in 1987.

Funny actors like Candy and Moranis are largely stiff (Candy more than Moranis) when they should be given free (or at least more free) reign to play to their heart’s content. This saps the film of many of the laughs it by all rights should have. I’m not saying the film is completely without laughs, but I didn’t laugh more than I did when we’re waylaid by the kind of exposition the serious versions of these films tend to insist on, and Moranis turns to the camera and barks, “Everyone got all that?”

Why do things not come together here? I think it can absolutely be a byproduct of the fact that Brooks has no real feelings for the Star Wars or Star Trek (or any of the other sprawling sci-fi epics of the age). He loved the James Whale Universal Horror films. That’s why Frankenstein is his best film. He loved Hitchcock movies, that’s why High Anxiety (1977) connects. He loves westerns. Hence, Blazing Saddles (1974)*. Here, I imagine that his kid loves sci-fi movies, and he has a mild fascination with them. That’s it. And so, the experience here is far more hollow then many of us want to admit.

*I’ve said it in other reviews, but no matter what my feelings about this film are, the fact that he was able to do both Frankenstein and Saddles within a year makes him an unassailable legend.

The Flintstones (1994)

Director: Brian Levant

Cast: John Goodman, Rick Moranis, Elizabeth Perkins, Rosie O’Donnell

Have I Seen It Before?: I think so? I have some degree of memory that Halle Berry was in the film, but the rest of it is hazy. I actually have far stronger memories of commercials embedded in my VHS recording of the Star Trek: The Next Generation series finale than I do of the film itself.

Did I like it?: Early on, I became a little concerned that I may actually like the movie. The creature work is sublime, bordering on actually bringing the improbable location of Bedrock to something resembling life. Dean Cundey as DP is always the thing a 90s movie needs. Whatever happened to him? Rick Moranis is pretty well cast, and he doesn’t appear in movies at all anymore, so it’s worth relishing the time we do have with him. John Goodman is a delight, because he is himself a delight. Here, he is indentured to the movie simply because he kind of looks like Fred Flintstone, and is relegated to doing a 90 minute long impression of Jackie Gleason, but that is hardly his fault. This is a movie based on a TV show that itself was a shameless rip off of The Honeymooners.

And so one is tempted to give the film a pass. This has got to be the best possible version of a movie based on The Flintstones possible. If they had to make a movie based on the material (and one supposes that they did), things could have gone far worse. Right? I would have thought the same thing, too, but then I read the recent comic book series featuring the characters. It was subversive and satirical, whereas the writing on display here (legend has it that the script was forged by a never-ending army of screenwriters) doesn’t elevate beyond the blandest sitcoms of the era. This movie could have reached for that level, but if there is one thing that Batman Returns (1992) taught us, it’s that subversive doesn’t sell Happy Meals.

But then one sees what I imagine is a Loch Ness Monster swimming around Bedrock lake, or half the scenes involving Dino, and realize that there may not be a pixel of CGI that has a shelf life of anything longer than fifteen minutes. Ever time I saw one of these polygonal monstrosities, I winced, and I winced far more than I did for any other part of the film. If the movie had only been Henson puppets, I just might have given it that pass for which it was reaching.

Ghostbusters (1984)

Director: Ivan Reitman

Cast: Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Sigourney Weaver

Have I Seen it Before: Do you want me to perform it for you?

Did I Like It: Top five, likely. Top ten, definitely.

Ghostbusters fandom is a divided place now, it seems. If you like the original films, the 2016 remake is akin to sacrilege, inciting a series of dumb opinions, many of which coming from people who have never seen the new film. Similarly, to those who really found something to attach themselves to in the new film, the original is less thrilling.

To wit, the question I come to as I start writing this review: Is it possible to like both the original and brand new Ghostbusters? I enjoyed the new film, and never once felt threatened by its existence. This may be one of the prime pieces of evidence supporting the notion that I’m not an entitled man baby, and just like funny movies about people catching ghosts. And yet, the original film is one of my all-time favorites. I hope it isn’t perceived as sexist to prefer the original, because I’m of the mind that ghostbusting must know no borders of race, creed, or gender.

Now that we have that out of the way, I will restrict my comments to the original film.

There’s something special about Bill Murray. With many comic actors—indeed, many of those appear in this film—there is a period where they are at their funniest. Not so with Murray, as while he changes as the years go by, each version of Murray is equally watchable. That being said, the Murray enjoyed by filmgoers in the 80s through the mid-90s is peak Murray. He’s aspirational. Some people my age might have wanted to be James Bond or Michael Jordan, but the kind of people I would most get along with wanted to be like any Bill Murray character, even if they couldn’t quite admit. Laid back, but charismatic. Funny, but no one’s fool. Loved—even if begrudgingly so—by the best of people, and detested by the worst. For someone trying to get by on his wits, Bill Murray is the peak of manliness, and no more so than in this movie.

There’s an interesting extension to the above thought that I realized during this viewing. Any role during this same period that Bill Murray played, Chevy Chase could have played as well, and vice versa. However, when Murray plays the role, he is the heroic scamp, where if Chase portrayed the character, he’d be an irredeemable asshole. If Murray had been in Fletch (1985), it would have been an even better film, and if Chase had played Dr. Peter Venkman, the movie would have suffered within this alternate universe.

While the movie lives and dies by Murray’s presence, the rest of the cast helps elevate the movie to a true classic worthy of eventual remake. In my deep Ghostbuster fandom, I once had occasion to read the original screenplay by Aykroyd and Ramis. The script is fine, but the movie as we have all come to enjoy it is not on the page, it is in the performances. This film is a brilliant low-key comedy wrapped up in the trappings of a summer blockbuster. The blockbuster elements will fade (and in the case of the special effects, already have), but the film will live forever, owing to the bizarre, ineffable alchemy that is the true fun of the movie.