A visually inventive and snappy comedy that pokes fun at the afterlife

Rating: 7/10 (24 March 2020)

When newlyweds Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis die in an automobile accident, they end up in limbo and are forced to haunt their old house as ghosts for the next fifty years with only a copy of the Handbook for the Recently Deceased to help them earn their wings and enter heaven. Unable to scare obnoxious yuppies Catherine O'Hara and Jeffrey Jones out of their old property, they enlist the help of yellow haired, snuggle toothed, profane, flatulent "gonzo" bio-exorcist Beetlejuice (played by Michael Keaton in a raucous and hilarious role originally intended for Sammy Davis Jr). Winona Ryder is the teenage goth daughter of O'Hara and Jones, always dressed in black who Beetlejuice falls in love with and tries to marry. Tim Burtons movie is a riot of invention that pokes fun at the afterlife, and won the Academy Award for Best Makeup. Just over one million of the fifteen million dollar budget was given over to visual effects, which include stop motion and replacement animation, prosthetic makeup, puppetry and blue screen. A critical and commercial success, the film spawned an animated TV series which Burton, producer David Geffen, and music composer Danny Elfman were all involved in, a video game and a Broadway musical.