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‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’ Review: Tim Burton’s Lightweight Sequel Works as Ghostly Fan Service
It's no "Beetlejuice," but Tim Burton's sequel — starring Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder and Jenna Ortega — has just enough Burton juice.
I first saw the movie at a Saturday-night sneak preview, before anyone knew a thing about it, and by the time it was over it was clear that the director, Tim Burton, was going to be a superstar who ruled over his own weirdly ardent world of ghoulish mockery. The vision of the afterlife as a waiting room of gonzo wax-museum horrors; the moment when those shrimp leapt off the plate in the spectacular “Day-O” musical demonic-possession sequence; and Michael Keaton ’s feral, jabbering, Groucho-Marx-meets-oozing-derelict performance as Beetlejuice the grotty bio-exorcist — the movie channeled a spirit that wasn’t just loopy, it was hilariously insane. The film opens with the tingle of Danny Elfman’s jumpy ghost music, along with another flyover shot of the picturesque town of Winter River, Connecticut, where Winona Ryder ’s Lydia Deetz, the former goth teen who interfaced with the spirit world, is now a psychic mediator who hosts her own hunt-for-the-paranormal television show entitled “Ghost House.” Lydia still wears her hair in spiky bangs, but where you might expect her to have relaxed into middle age, the way Ryder plays her she’s more distraught than ever.
Or read this on Variety
