Like many fans of cinema, I have a love/hate relationship with Tim Burton. I love what he's done and I hate what he's become. With the recent release of the critically-panned Dark Shadows, featuring the Tim Burton trademark of pale Johnny Depp, I've decided to take a trip through his filmography re-live his successes and re-evaluate his failures.
Beetlejuice, Tim Burton's second feature film, is the film that introduced me to Winona Ryder, Geena Davis, Catherine O'Hara (not Home Alone!), and Jeffrey Jones. Alec Baldwin looks so "everyman" in his role as Adam Maitland that I didn't recognize him in subsequent roles, and it was years before I knew that Beetlejuice was the same guy playing Batman.
Baldwin and Davis play Adam and Barbara Maitland play a recently deceased couple struggling to adjust to their newfound life(death)style while at the same trying to scare the Deetz family out of moving into their house. When they fail to get the job done, they enlist the services of Betelguese (Michael Keaton).
Despite being the titular character (though spelled differently), Betelguese doesn't actually have a lot of screen time, but in that short time Keaton conjures up one of the most memorable characters in film history. That may be nostalgia talking, but Keaton's mannerisms, vulgarity, makeup, and pin-stripe suit present a pretty solid case that it's not. I challenge anyone with a good sense of humor to watch the film and not walk away completely enamored with the character.
However, the film is about more than just Betelguese. The narrative gets a little muddied in the second act, where it doesn't seem to know who it wants to be about. It's juggling Betelguese, Lydia, and the Maitlands all at once, all with different ideas and goals. That by itself isn't a horrible crime, but it becomes hard to get invested in the story because you don't know what outcome you're rooting for. Fortunately, this all clears up by the third act as Lydia and the Maitlands's desires converge.
Time has had a weird effect on special effects. Beetlejuice was released in 1988, and while the effects are undeniablely cheesy, featuring obvious green screens and stop-motion animation, they've gained a certain charm. When Barbara steps out of the house and winds up in the desert, with a sandworm bursting out of the dunes behind her, it's not really necessary to believe that she's in a real, tangible place, only to believe that she's been transported to a surreal place beyond our understanding. Special effects work best when they're used to create visuals that can only exist in our imaginations.
Would Beetlejuice be considered a horror comedy? I think that would be appropriate, though it clearly weighs more on the comedy side of things. It's a fantastic movie and I was consistently laughing, especially when Beetlejuice was on screen. It's full of likable characters and all comes to a satisfying conclusion. It's one of those movies I loved as a kid, before I was old and wise enough to fully appreciate it. I just liked when Beetlejuice cursed and squeezed his crotch. I still like that, but I like everything else about it, too.
