Inspired

Rating: 10/10 (2 March 2011)

Whenever I get annoyed at Tim Burton's propensity for hacking the work of others to pieces with blithe disregard, in order to build something with his own stamp (Batman, Sleepy Hollow, Alice In Wonderland et al), I remember Beetlejuice.
Beetlejuice is a work of fierce originality. Telling the story of freshly deceased ordinary couple Adam and Barbara, forced to share the house they love (and are restricted to) with the family from hell, it is savagely original in concept and execution. Nominally centring on the bio-exorcist Beetlejuice, it spreads its favours far and wide - Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis as the dead couple, Jeffrey Jones and the exquisitely funny Catherine O'Hara as the new residents, Winona Rider as their terminally depressed daughter and Glenn Shadix as their appalling interior designer, and Michael Keaton in a career establishing turn as the over-the-top Beetlejuice himself.
The special effects are great, as is production design, but the real star here is the story and script. Any film which can deliver a sequence so brilliantly conceived, staged, and performed (just watch the faces of the dinner guests!) as the Banana Boat Song sequence is a classic.