My feelings about the new Ghostbusters with an all female cast were basically “can I see it now please?” If you are a guy and you are wondering why that would be, read this.
Ghostbusters is a particularly campy action franchise, which is my favorite kind ( for example, my preferred Batman is the one with Jack Nicholson). I also dumbly associate Ghostbusters with mainlining this stuff at McDonald’s during lent. (Because I gave up soda, just like Jesus told us to!)
Ghostbusters is just gleefully fun and all-American, without any pretense of taking on topics like middle east relations. Do I really want someone named Captain America to get anywhere near that topic? No. But that’s another discussion!
I was also pretty excited about the cast. I love Leslie Jones. I think she’s the only person on SNL right now who gets close to Will Ferrell levels of presence. When she’s on screen, she’s ON SCREEN! you know? She was on Live with Kelly the other day and even dropped an eff bomb, and no one cared! That kind of thing used to end careers.
One of my first impressions was that I forgot how dumb Ghostbusters is. Like the villains and ghosts are just globulous and goofy as hell. I’m used to the age of the antihero where villains are super sexy or complicated and getting to know them takes up half the movie. Here, they do look like they just jumped off a Hi-C container and are now driving a car into a vortex. That’s fun.
I was also expecting Leslie Jones to be a more central star of the movie, not necessarily like, “Patty, the lady who works at the subway who isn’t our fellow scientist friend.” That said, I think she quickly stole the screen once she was initiated into the team.
Kate McKinnon’s character has a really quirky style here, with her yellow goggles and colorful weaponry. At some points her zaniness felt a little indulgent, but mostly it was just very fun.
I was also not expecting Chris Hemsworth to be in the movie, playing this dumb beefcake secretary. It’s definitely an overt reference to the types of roles women get to play in male-driven movies. In some ways, this is fun. It’s like, hey men, see how it feels to be only represented by a blonde Greek god who doesn’t know how a phone works! In other ways I’m like hold on, is empowerment just doing what men do back to them? But now I’m thinking too much. It’s a comedy and it’s gonna parody stuff. Chris Hemsworth is always invited into my line of vision!
Overall, Ghostbusters was badass, and I’m sure I’ll watch it many times, as women tend to do when kickass movies starring a bunch of women come out. (How many times did you and your friends watch Charlie’s Angels growing up?)
I do think the real success for women in Hollywood will be when women create more stories about women things (like relationships, emotions, periods, jk). Putting women in an originally male movie is a huge step, and I don’t mean to undermine it. But hopefully more women in Hollywood will mean more variety than the current banquet of action-based blockbusters. I would love more backstories, less chase scenes, in general. (Why are chase scenes so long? Are we all captivated by how chasing works?)
Overall, I thought this movie was a success. Lighthearted, campy, fun, blissfully dumb when it wants to be, and very pro-lady. So watch it, and watch it again! Anyway, now I’m going to figure out where I can get some Hi-C.