It’s the comedy blockbuster that spawned a hit single title song (although lifted from a Huey Lewis track) and elevated Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, the late Harold Ramis and Sigourney Weaver to superstardom.
Directed by Ivan Reitman from a screenplay by Aykroyd and Ramis, GHOSTBUSTERS is the tale of three parapsychologists, Raymond Stantz, Peter Venkman and Egon Spengler (Aykroyd, Murray, Ramis) who are kicked out of Columbia University and decide to go into business for themselves, thanks to collateral from Stantz’s parents.
Holing up in an old fire station and converting a second-hand ambulance into the ‘Ectomobile’ , their fortunes change when they are called upon to deal with a ghost in the Sedgwick Hotel.
Venkman also has to deal with the predicament of musician Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver) who has discovered the entity of a being called Zuul which has appeared in her fridge at her Central Park apartment. Pretty soon, demand for the ‘Ghostbusters’, as they are called, increases, but with increased success and demand comes concern, notably in the form of Walter Peck (William Atherton, DIE HARD) who believes that there is a lot of concern about the sheer amount of containment in their facility.
The city has a lot of spirit within – and all hell is about to break loose….
With visual effects by Richard Edlund (STAR WARS, 2010), GHOSTBUSTERS combines the best tradition of classic comedy with amazing visual effects in a film that spawned a direct sequel in 1989 and a more recent all-female reboot starring Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy that was just as much fun, although purists and fans have disagreed at times on it. A new movie, GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE, is imminent.