Beetlejuice Beetlejuice review – squelchy, stripy sequel fun

The legacy sequel has become hot property in Hollywood, with every studio digging the depths of their archive for properties ripe for resurrection – it’s free real estate! But when it comes to the cinematic afterlife, at least bringing Beetlejuice back from the grave makes narrative sense. Tim Burton’s “Ghost With The Most” captured the hearts of countless teen goths and cemented Winona Ryder’s status as a Gen X icon, as well as sending sales for striped suits into the stratosphere. In fact, a sequel was greenlit back in 1990 but has taken 34 years to materialise, with various scrapped plans including a script for Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian by Jonathan Gems (who would later work with Burton on Mars Attacks!).

In the end, Burton decided to stick closer to home when Warner Brothers finally ponied up for a sequel. With original stars Ryder and Catherine O’Hara reprising their roles as Lydia and Delia Deetz – plus Michael Keaton as the bothersome bio-exorcist – Beetlejuice Beetlejuice sees Jenna Ortega join the family as Lydia’s daughter Astrid, who has a tempestuous relationship with her TV medium mother in a manner that mirrors the maternal dynamic from the first film. Following the death of her father Charles during a birdwatching expedition, Lydia reunites with her daughter and stepmother for a family funeral, upended when her skeevy boyfriend/manager Rory (Justin Theroux) proposes a Halloween wedding. Meanwhile, in the afterlife, Beetlejuice is avoiding a family reunion of his own as his murderous ex-wife Delores (Monica Belluci) quite literally pieces herself back together and swears revenge, with B-Movie actor turned ghostly gumshoe Wolf Jackson (Willem Dafoe) hot on her case.

It’s a sequel that refreshingly doesn’t lack ideas, in fact suffering a little from an excess of them, with three villains popping up in a fairly compact 100-minute runtime. Despite being set up as the film’s Big Bad, Delores disappears for half the film without explanation – which may be a blessing considering Bellucci’s acting talents – as a secondary villain is established, while Beetlejuice himself schemes to reunite with his one-time bride-to-be Lydia. All the while there’s gross-out humour, creatively staged corpses and shrunken heads aplenty, harkening to the gothy zaniness that was, at the height of his career, Burton’s trademark.

Having enjoyed something of a renaissance since his work on the Netflix series Wednesday (which is where he initially met Ortega) this is Burton’s first film in five years, since the disappointing Disney “live-action” Dumbo – which even Keaton concedes he was bad in – and comfortably his best work since 2012’s Frankenweenie (and his best live-action work since 2007’s Sweeney Todd).

Reuniting with many of his regular collaborators including costume designer Colleen Atwood and production designer Mark Scruton as well as – of course – Danny Elfman, Burton works hard to conjure up some of the macabre magic which made the original film a cult classic, paying homage but – for the most part – avoiding repetition. Keaton is clearly having a ball reprising one of his most well-known roles, and Ryder transitions Lydia Deetz into a world-weary, well-meaning parent with charm as Catherine O’Hara continues to be a joy in everything she does. Ortega fits into the Deetz family without merely impersonating Ryder’s original iconic performance, but Dafoe gets the best of the script with his preening, hyper-committed actor missing half his skull following an unfortunate on-set accident. Justin Theroux is an unexpected highlight too even as a character lacking originality (there’s some decidedly cringy boomer humour in Alfred Gough and Miles Millar’s script).

Even with the inevitable sheen of a big-money studio sequel Burton has an enduring affection for practical effects, and although there’s obvious use of CGI, this doesn’t feel overly obvious or distracting, aided by the film’s moody cinematography and elaborate set design which helps to create a sense of cohesion. It’s obvious that Burton in himself has become a strange sort of (R)IP, but considering the extent to which low-effort cash-grab sequels continue to plague the box office, it’s refreshing to watch one that is so entertaining, particularly given that Burton’s career had been at a creative nadir for some years (“We agreed ‘No Disney'” one character says in a line that feels more than a little pointed) before he regained some of his spirit with Wednesday.

Although Beetlejuice Beetlejuice suffers a little from an overabundance of ideas leading to a bit of a third-act scramble, and its plot points are sign-posted so large you can see them a mile away, it’s a much better-executed and enjoyable film than it has any right to be, charmingly reverent and referential to the point that even its cliche story beats can be mostly excused, undoubtedly down to the game attitudes of its cast and crew. If Burton can just bring such enthusiasm to a new pet project, we might be back in business.

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