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'''Beetlejuice''' (alternative spelling: Beetle Juice) is a film directed by Tim Burton, first released in the USA on March 30, 1988, and produced by The Geffen Film Company for Warner Bros. Pictures. The plot revolves around two recently deceased ghosts, Adam Maitland (Alec Baldwin) and his wife, Barbara, (Geena Davis), who seek the help of an obnoxious bio-exorcist, Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton), to remove the new owners of their house -- a family of metropolitan yuppies from New York City named Deetz. The Deetz family consists of Charles (Jeffrey Jones), his second wife, Delia (Catherine O'Hara), and his teenage daughter Lydia (Winona Ryder). This marks the first time that Keaton and Burton teamed up. The second and third times were in ''Batman'' and ''Batman Returns''. The score was composed by Danny Elfman.

Contents

Plot

Production

The World of Beetlejuice

Portrayal of the afterlife

Critical Reaction

TV series

Script changes

Universal Studios Theme Parks

References in popular culture

Trivia

References

External links

Plot

The story begins with the Maitlands, Adam (Alec Baldwin) and his wife Barbara (Geena Davis), a young couple living in the small town of Winter River, Connecticut. Adam and Barbara are about to begin their much needed vacation, but first, Adam needs to make a quick trip to the hardware store. Barbara decides to come along. On the way back, they swerve off the road to avoid hitting a dog, and their car goes over the side of the Winter River Bridge. Upon their return home, the couple start to notice some strange things: Barbara's hand catches fire, but she's not burned. No matter what they do, they can't seem to get warm. They have no reflections. No one else can see them. When Adam tries to backtrack their steps from the bridge (how they got back home is still a mystery), he's transported to a desert which is infested with monstrous sandworms. Then, they find a book entitled ''The Handbook for the Recently Deceased.'' "I don't think we survived that crash," Barbara says.
Away in the afterlife, Betelgeuse is reading the newspaper and sees the Maitland's obituary. He remarks on how gullible they look. Not long after, Adam and Barbara get a rude awakening: Barbara's sister, Jane, has sold their house to the Deetz family from New York, which she had been trying to do before the Maitlands died. Charles Deetz is a contractor for a major real estate company. His wife, Delia (Lydia's stepmother) is a sculptor known for her creepy art style. She hates the look of the house, and wants to make some major changes. Charles' daughter, Lydia, is a rebellious teenager with an interest in photography and a bleak outlook on life. In addition, Delia's friend, Otho, has come along to give her some decorating tips for the old house.
Adam and Barbara want to get the Deetz's out of the house and decide to act like ghosts in order to do so. This proves to be difficult since they cannot be seen, although Lydia appears to notice them. Adam locks the Deetz's out of the attic, which the Maitlands consider to be their sanctuary. After several frustrating attempts to scare the Deetz's away, and after getting several messages from Betelguese, the Maitlands talk with Juno, their caseworker, who gives them advice on how to do a proper haunting. She also warns them to stay away from Betelgeuse, who she says was once her assistant, but he just couldn't stay out of trouble: the only way to summon him is by calling his name three times. Taking Juno's advice, they try something simple and put on old sheets and moan like ghosts. This is also unsuccessful at frightening the family, but it causes them to meet Lydia. When asked how she can see them, Lydia says she read their handbook, which states that normal people usually ignore things that are strange and unusual. "I myself am strange and unusual," she says. She quickly becomes a friend of the Maitlands and agrees to convince her parents to move out if Adam and Barbara really want their house back. Her parents, however, don't believe her story about the ghosts.
Back in the attic, Adam and Barbara get up the guts to summon Betelgeuse, who is living in Adam's scale model of the town. They call out his name three times, causing themselves to shrink down to scale with the model. When they meet Betelgeuse, he turns out to be even worse than Juno described him, and they refuse to do business with him. Barbara transports herself and Adam back to the attic by crying "Home" three times, leaving Betelgeuse still wandering the model. Eventually Adam gets an idea of how to scare off the Deetz's on their own: downstairs, Delia is hosting a dinner party for several of her friends and associates from New York. In the middle of dinner, everyone, except for Lydia, is placed under possession. They begin dancing around the table and sing the calypso, "The Banana Boat Song." Back in the attic, the Maitlands watch, expecting to see the guests running to their cars in terror. Lydia comes to the door and tells them that no one was scared by their little stunt; in fact, they loved it. Charles even wants to merchandise it. They want the Maitlands to come down and introduce themselves. When Lydia returns downstairs without the Maitlands, she explains that they want to be left alone. Disappointed, Delia's guests leave. Irritated, Delia leads the family upstairs to confront the ghosts. When the attic door finally opens, the room appears deserted (the Maitlands are hiding outside the window). Otho finds the handbook and steals it, before leaving. Betelgeuse laughs at the Maitlands pathetic attempts to scare people and goes to work himself.
Downstairs, Charles is making plans to bring his partner, Maxie Dean, to see the property. Suddenly, Betelgeuse appears in the form of a snake. He attacks the Deetz's, but stops when he gets to Lydia. There's something that he likes about her. Barbara stops him by calling out his name. Lydia is upset, thinking the snake was another of the Maitlands' attempts to scare them away. Back in the attic, the Maitlands confront Betelgeuse until he is distracted by the appearance of a fully staffed brothel in the model town. Adam and Barbara are suddenly transported to Juno's office, where she explains that she set up the brothel as a distraction for Betelgeuse. She is furious at the Maitlands; they've risked the exposure of the afterlife by allowing themselves to be photographed by Lydia, let Otho take their handbook, and they have released Betelgeuse and not put him back. She orders them to return to the house and chase the Deetz's away for good. On their way back, they begin to question their assignment. They both like Lydia too much to see her go.
Back at the house, the Deetz's are preparing for the arrival of Maxie Dean and his wife Sarah. Otho has something special planned; a spell to summon the Maitlands' spirits. Meanwhile, Lydia is in her room, drafting a suicide note for her parents. She goes up to the attic, looking for the Maitlands, and instead, finds Betelgeuse. He agrees to take her to the other side (killing her), if she lets him out of the model by saying his name. He plays charades with her to help her guess his name, since even he can't say it out loud. After guessing his name, she recognizes him as the snake. Betelgeuse denies this and commands her to say his name. Just then, the Maitlands arrive and stop her. They convince her not to kill herself and tell her that they've decided to let her family stay. Downstairs, Lydia finds that the Deans have arrived and Otho begins the spell he thought up using the handbook.
The spell summons the Maitlands into the room and causes them to start to wither and decay: apparently it is an exorcism spell. They were warned that for ghosts who are exorcised, it's like a second death. Desperate, Lydia finds Betelgeuse and begs him to help the Maitlands. He agrees, but only if Lydia agrees to marry him -- this is apparently the only way he can get out of the afterlife for good. Reluctantly, Lydia agrees, and calls out his name. Betelgeuse appears and removes the Deans from the house. As promised, Betelgeuse frees the Maitlands from Otho's spell, although he is anything but gentle about it. As Otho tries to run from the house, Betelgeuse torments him by changing his traditional black outfit into a tacky leisure suit. Having fulfilled his end of the bargain, it's now time for Lydia to fulfill hers. Betelgeuse attempts to marry Lydia to escape from the afterlife. Barbara then ultimately "destroys" Betelgeuse by bringing a sandworm through the house, which eats him. The Maitlands and Deetz's finally meet and reconcile their differences.
Several months later, things seem to be better. The Maitlands and the Deetz's are at peace and Lydia has a better outlook on life. Betelgeuse, obviously having survived the ordeal, is back where he started in the afterlife, and is still getting into trouble.

Production

The film was originally titled ''The Maitlands'', as Adam and Barbara have much more screen time than Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton spent only two weeks filming his scenes and only appears in 17.5 minutes of the film's entire 92-minute running time.) The studio disliked the title "Beetlejuice" and wanted to call the film "House Ghosts." As a joke, Burton suggested the name "Scared Sheetless" and was horrified when the studio actually considered using it.^[1]
The film was originally meant to be less humorous than it ultimately became. Tim Burton decided to go for a more comical approach after Michael Keaton came on board as Betelgeuse. Most of Keaton's lines were apparently improvised on set. Wes Craven was set to direct the film at one time, when it was still more of a horror film.
Notable guest appearances include those of Robert Goulet and Dick Cavett (Delia's art agent). Two songs from Harry Belafonte are featured in the movie, most notably in a scene in which Delia starts belting out "The Banana Boat Song" in the voice of Harry Belafonte (thanks to some spectral trickery) at a dinner that she and Charles are hosting.
There are references to 'Dune' in the sandworms on planet Saturn, and to The Fly when Betelgeuse pulls a fly underground to eat it as it screams "Help Me!" repeatedly.
Although the Maitland/Deetz home is in Connecticut according to the script, the film was actually shot in East Corinth, Vermont. Many of the town's buildings were painted and changed for the movie. A complete facade was built over the library and a cover to the bridge was added for the film.
Beetlejuice was not granted an extravagant budget, particularly after ''Little Shop of Horrors'' ended up costing more than expected. As a result of this—and of the director's improvisational style—some of the effects work may seem cheap and old-fashioned, especially by today's standards. Sometimes, however, the need to produce effects quickly and cheaply added to their quality. Scenes like the sand worm scene were shot in stop motion animation. And the shot of Barbara lifting up a toy horse in front of a mirror (demonstrating that while it cast a reflection, she did not) was achieved entirely in-camera, using an empty mirror frame, a partial set built beyond and two toy horses bolted together. The resulting shot is an illusion with no matte work or consequent loss of image definition.
Maybe because of the limited budget, the film features some notable inconsistencies and bloopers, some more obvious than others.

The World of Beetlejuice

The name of the film is ''Beetlejuice'', and the character's name is pronounced "Beetlejuice" by the actors, but in the film itself the character's name is always spelled "Betelgeuse", like the star. Repeating this name three times is all that is required to summon him; three more repetitions will make him leave. Adam and Barbara are not his only victims, for scams are his specialty. He used to be an assistant to Juno (Sylvia Sidney), the Maitlands' case worker, before getting into trouble (he tried exorcism on the living instead of the dead, hence his nickname the bio-exorcist). Betelgeuse is rude, vulgar and lecherous, eats insects, and loves to terrify people.
The movie paints a picture of the afterlife as stuffy and bureaucratic rather than Dantean, with waiting rooms, oceans of red tape, and required reading (''The Handbook for the Recently Deceased''). People who commit suicide, for example, have become bored civil servants. Adam and Barbara are trapped in their house. The world outside is a parched nightmare of sand dunes and a sandworm (Betelgeuse calls this place Saturn, but it is clearly a reference to Frank Herbert's ''Dune''). When exorcised, spirits are trapped in the room of lost souls. Lydia is the only living character who sees the couple, and is tapped to help them deal both with her obnoxious parents and with the crass and impetuous Betelgeuse.
When characters die in the world of Beetlejuice, they apparently always return as ghosts. When first appearing as a ghost, characters do not seem to be able to understand what has happened to them. As time goes on, and characters become more and more aware of their ghost nature, they become more and more powerful. (Adam and Barbara make themselves look scary, but are apparently unseen by the new family. Adam and Barbara possess the new family during dinner and cause them to dance. Adam and Barbara allow Lydia to levitate at the end.)
Betelgeuse has been dead for a very long time (he claims to have "lived through the Black Plague"), and has almost limitless powers. He is seemingly banished to the model town in the attic of the house, where his powers are greatly reduced. When released, he is able to control inanimate objects to attack people, create or transform objects (which he mostly does with clothes), shrink and enlarge people, imitate other people, summon objects and people at will, and banish people to ‘Saturn’.

Portrayal of the afterlife

Beetlejuice seems to be inspired by Jean-Paul Sartre's existentialist novel ''Les jeux sont faits'' (1952), which prominently features death as meaningless bureaucracy, albeit presented in a much less morbid fashion. A baital, in ancient Indian lore, is an evil spirit that inhabits dead bodies, and is perhaps the origin of both the name Beetlejuice as well as the name for the beetle insect. Also, as in the LucasArts adventure game ''Grim Fandango'', people who commit crimes in life are forced to work off their time at the nightmarishly bureaucratic "Department of Death". An interesting contrast can be made with Burton's later work ''Corpse Bride'', where the afterlife is vibrant and exciting, and the land of the living is grey and boring. All these are examples of Bangsian fantasy. Various esoteric and magical elements, such as exorcism, incantations, and seances, are prevalent in the afterlife as portrayed in this film. Religion occupies almost no identifiable role in the film, aside from fleeting references to Heaven and Hell.

Critical Reaction

Time Out London was massively impressed by the film, declaring that "the off-the wall humour and some sensational sight gags make the movie, maddeningly disjointed though it sometimes is, a truly astonishing piece of work."^[2] Roger Ebert took a different view, wishing the film had been more character-driven and had "cut back on the slapstick."^[3]

TV series

Main articles: Beetlejuice (TV series)

An animated television series called ''Beetlejuice'', ran on ABC from September 9, 1989 to December 6, 1991, featuring the voices of Stephen Ouimette, Alyson Court, and Tara Strong. Lydia and Betelgeuse are friends, and she frequently visits him at home in the Netherworld (called the Neitherworld in the cartoon). Many of the jokes revolve around dark humor and visual puns. ''Beetlejuice'' had a cast of wacky neighbors: Jacques, a French skeleton fitness buff; Ginger, a tap-dancing spider; The Monster across the Street, a boisterous Texas redneck; and a nasty clown named Scuzzo, who is his arch-nemesis. Notably missing are the characters of Adam and Barbara Maitland.

Script changes

In the original script by Michael McDowell and Larry Wilson there were many elements that were changed in the final film. The character of Lydia, for example, was originally one of two Deetz daughters. A younger sister, Cathy, was to have been the girl who befriended the Maitlands, while elder Lydia served as the object of Betelgeuse's lust. Re-writes merged the two characters into the Lydia seen in the final film.
Additionally, bio-exorcisim was initially portrayed as a tactic sanctioned by the ''Handbook for the Recently Deceased'', the performance of which involved calling on a friendly spirit called Swallowtail. Betelgeuse was shown to have disabled Swallowtail and maliciously taken over the job for his own purposes. Initially his efforts to "help" the Maitlands consisted of disguising himself in various human forms and playing obnoxious pranks on the Deetz family; for example, pretending at one point to be an IRS agent and auditing Charles Deetz. Gradually, his actions became more and more malevolent, especially toward the two daughters. When his destructive intentions became apparent, the Deetzs and Maitlands joined forces to hold a traditional exorcism, ultimately banishing Betelgeuse from the Earth. The story ended with the Maitlands moving into Adam's model of their home, which was still arranged and decorated as was their real home at the time of their deaths.
In the early drafts the character of Juno did not yet exist, nor did the bureaucratic afterlife. These functions in scenes and plot points were filled by Betelgeuse and/or Swallowtail; for example, it was originally Betelgeuse who suggested the Maitlands hone their haunting skills by wearing sheets around the house. Other minor changes included Charles Deetz's career (originally he was a best-selling author) and instead of facing sandworms, the Maitlands initially found themselves inside of a giant clock when they stepped away from their home. Also of interest is Betelgeuse's original description, which in the 2nd draft of the screenplay reads (sic): "He is small and wiry, dark, with vaguely Middle-Eastern features. Here, and whenever we see him again at the beginning of a scene, his eyes are COLD and YELLOW and SHAPED LIKE A SNAKE'S -- but after a moment, they melt, becoming human, and liquid, and brown." During his exorcism, he transformed into a winged demon: evidently his true shape.
Warren Skaaren was the only writer credited for the extensive re-writes requested by Tim Burton. Other writers who were uncredited for their work on the film are Charles McKeown and Jonathan Gems.

Universal Studios Theme Parks

The Betelgeuse character was made the host of a live musical attraction at various Universal Studios Theme parks. The show is called "Beetlejuice's Rock 'N Roll Graveyard Revue." Although shows are different at various parks, the plot follows the story of Betelgeuse taking possession of the Universal Studios monsters and turning them into rock stars. Various incarnations of the show include The Wolf Man, The Frankenstein Monster, Dracula, The Bride of Frankenstein, and The Phantom of the Opera. In the Orlando version, Betelgeuse has two gothic cheerleaders known as Hip and Hop. These 2 characters originated as "back-up dancers" in the Universal, Japan version.

References in popular culture

★ The band AFI quotes Lydia's line "My whole life is a dark room. One...big...dark...room" in the song The Despair Factor.

★ In the popular musical 'Return to the forbidden planet' Captin Tempest says the line "What the betelgeuse do you look like?" when Miranda changes her look for him.

★ In the video game Shin Megami Tensei II, there is an enemy called "Betelgeuse" which has a serpentine form that is fought as a boss as well as a humanoid form that is fought as a normal encounter.

Trivia

★ In An Evening with Kevin Smith, Kevin Smith talks of being offered to rewrite a draft script for a tentative sequel, entitled 'Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian', whilst working on the project Superman Lives. Based on Internet rumour, the second movie would see Betelgeuse accompanying the Maitlands to Hawaii for various undead tropical hijinks. Smith responded with, "Didn't we say all we needed to say in the first Beetlejuice? Must we go tropical?' Before Smith, ''Mars Attacks'' screenwriter Jonathan Gems turned in a draft as well.

★ Juno's watch alarm plays a brief quote from the third movement of Chopin's 'Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 35', commonly known as a funeral march.

★ The orange snake in The Nightmare Before Christmas that swallowed the child's Christmas Tree is the sandworm from Beetlejuice. Both films had Tim Burton involved in the producing.

References

1. HAUNTINGS : Beetlejuice Jarrett Friend
2. Beetlejuice DVD review
3. Beetlejuice review Roger Ebert

External links

★

★ Reviews of Beetlejuice at Rotten Tomatoes

★ The Maitland House compilation of exterior shots throughout the film