Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire
Please stop calling them.
After accepting their family legacy in Oklahoma, the Spengler family immediately packs up and moves to New York City, because who the fuck would want to stay in Oklahoma given the choice? Once there, they move into the original Ghostbusters old firehouse, strap on their proton packs, and start doing that which makes them feel the most good… busting ghosts. But when a newly rediscovered ancient artifact unleashes a long-imprisoned evil force, Ghostbusters old and new must unite to save the world from the threat of a ghostly second ice age.
Desperate to wring every single drop of blood from this franchise’s stone, and absolutely convinced that people fucking love the wacky antics of the miniature Stay-Puft Marshmallow Men, Colombia Pictures is back once again with another try-hard installment of the franchise that no one, except for Dan Aykroyd, really seems to want more of. Despite having never actually made a good follow-up film to the first all-time classic movie, the studio is doing their best Bullwinkle J. Moose imitation here, in the vain hope that it’ll work this time for sure. But judging by how I heard almost nothing about this film after its release, I’m gonna go out on a limb before hitting play on this film and guess that, just like every other time has shown us… that trick never works.
Maybe they should try a size seven and a half.
Well, color me shocked…
This one turned out to be… kinda not bad.
I’m not claiming there’s anything fantastic going on here, or that you should rush out and watch it, but still… it was kinda cute, if not all that surprising or innovative. The stakes are the usual kind of a typical apocalypse. The old gods awaken. The dead are free to walk the earth. The skies darken. The seas freeze. The cats and dogs are living together. And then in the end, the enemy is defeated through the power of friendship and the ghostbuster version of the Care Bear Stare. As a film, it’s never truly “bad,” so much as “always just as expected.”
The cold open chase sequence is pretty fun, and sets a good tone, but after that, the rest of the movie struggles to match that energy. Ultimately, just like every attempt to capitalize on the audience’s love of the first classic film, the latest Ghostbusters movie has too many characters with too little to do, works too hard to be funny and is also full of fanservice, all while bogging itself down in the mythology of both its main bad guy, as well as the Ghostbusters themselves, over complicating what is an otherwise simple idea, the selling of which would have probably been best left to the chemistry of the phenomenal cast.
The film revolves around a very obviously heavily-cursed object, an object that is so heavily cursed, it might as well be wearing a sandwich board and have flashing neon arrows pointing at it, but of course, it is completely ignored until finally the monster escapes. This monster is an ancient (like always) Sumerian deity of some kind, who is so scary, it brings with it the threat of a new Ice Age, as it freezes the world with fear, a sequence which, from the way it’s portrayed in the movie, probably killed thousands of New Yorkers. It turns out, this frigid apocalypse can only be stopped by the last of an ancient group of hereditary magical Firebenders (Kumail Nanjiani), with the issue being he’s a slacker, a fuck up, and a general ne’er-do-well, who is living in his dead grandma’s apartment, and pawning her old magical Firebender gear in order to fund his Sneaker-Head side hustle.
The film spends way too much time on side quests, weak character building, and general “wackiness,” all while the characters first ignore the very obvious bad signs and omens, and then, while the others slowly turn in circles, focuses on a few of them as they oh so slowly unravel the main conflict’s needlessly complicated and incredibly obvious backstory. Thankfully, the main infodump in the film is delivered by Gen X’s favorite nerd, Patton Oswalt, who shows up like a breath of fresh air in the hot and musty back-stacks of an old library.
While all of this is happening (or not happening), the film focuses on Phoebe, the youngest Spengler kid, who’s been prohibited from busting ghosts because she’s only 15, despite being a natural. Weirdly, despite the fact that she is barred from working a job for being too young, she is still allowed to wander into Washington Square Park in the middle of the night, alone, where she meets Melody, a teenage ghost who died in a fire that she herself caused, killing herself and her whole family. As a result, Melody is stuck here, unable to pass on to the afterlife, cursed to forever carry a matchbook that only ever has one match, until she completes her unfinished business.
Hmmm… a matchbook that only ever has one match and some unfinished business to boot, you say? And all while an untrained “Firebender” is desperately preparing so he can face down an apocalyptic Ice Demon too? Gosh, I wonder how all of this stuff will tie together? Somebody make some popcorn. I am intrigued.
The only thing that is less surprising than the big climax, is that, despite the intense flirting and the frankly incredible amount of longing gazes that pass between Phoebe and Melody, the film is too much of a coward to allow an actual romance to blossom between them. They’re just friends, people, very good friends who are planning on adopting a German Shepherd and being roommates forever, okay?
This film’s entire problem, much like every other attempt to follow the first film, is that its missing that undefinable something (a bunch of somethings really, if we’re being honest), that gave the original Ghostbusters that working-man punk rock feel, and that shit is fundamental to making a film that feels like Ghostbusters, instead the touring company’s version of Ghostbusters on a Sunday matinee in Peoria. On top of that, as I said, the film simply has too much going on and not enough room for any of it, so it commits to none of it, and instead trudges through its needlessly complex mythology, and all seemingly with this belief that the legacy of the Ghostbusters franchise is something we all have this deep, deep reverence for.
It’s a delusional film, at its core, trying to cram in too many characters, too many ideas, too many storylines, and too many nods to Ghostbusters lore, but hey, at least it was still able to clear the incredibly low bar of striking a better balance with the fan service, the nostalgia, and the story than the last movie did. But all that having been said, even at just less than two hours, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire feels like Slimer (a character who, despite having no reason to do so, also appears in the film) after eating a mountain of snacks…
It’s ready to burst.
Still, there’s no denying that the film is totally able to coast on the charm of its cast. Kumail Nanjiani, Patton Oswalt, Paul Rudd, not to mention the returning cast, Bill Murray, Dan Akroyd, Ernie Hudson, and Annie Potts, that’s some real big-time talent and charm there. And despite Carrie Coon being criminally underused as the Mom who is just trying to keep it all together, and Finn Wolfhard having absolutely nothing to do in this film, they’re both great too. Phoebe is fine, and the other kids in this film with nothing to do are too, despite making less of an impression. Regardless, in the end, if nothing else, the film has a whole bunch of charm.
It’s fun, for the most part.
I do kind of wish the movie had truly gone all in though. After a while, I was hoping that Kirsten Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Lesley Jones, and Kate McKinnon would also get to show up for a quick cameo. I mean, why not? Why not spit in the faces of the misogynistic fans who were so mad about that Ghostbusters film, and besides, at this point in the franchise, what’s “more” nostalgia really mean?
But even more strange… where was Rick Moranis and Sigourney Weaver?
Maybe the film didn’t include them because their obvious sexual chemistry was just too much for this family friendly film. I can understand that, it nearly was for us kids back when the original film came out. Oh man… when the Keymaster finally found the Gatekeeper? Many Shuvs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Slor that day, I can tell you.
In the end, this is not a bad film. It’s obvious and overly complicated, yes, but it’s a cute film, and an occasionally entertaining film too, but it’s also not a whole film. It’s more like half a film. It’s half a film with a decent foundation of ideas and a charming cast, but still… it’s half a film, which makes it a whole failure.
Long story short? There’s probably better films out there that you can watch.