REVIEW: BEETLEJUICE, BEETLEJUICE

3/5

Say My Name, Say My Name

104 Mins. Starring: Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Catherine O'Hara, Justin Theroux, Monica Bellucci, Jenna Ortega & Willem Dafoe. Screenwriters: Alfred Gough & Miles Millar. Director: Tim Burton. In: Theatres.

The Juice is loose! Madison Square Garden, late October 2001. NBA legend Michael Jordan is making his second stint out of retirement with his season debut against the New York Knicks...a team he gave nightmares back in the day. It's a big deal, and everybody's in town. Even an esteemed British sports journalist from the BBC, who, although game for giving it his best shot, is as out of his depth as someone trying to guard MJ. Already corrected for calling this game, "a match" (c'mon, guys) he looks for a friendly, familiar face to talk to. And he finds one like you only could courtside in one of his favourite movie stars. Michael Keaton. Surely, this will make great TV, to shoot the breeze with this legend. What could go wrong? He asks him, what does he think of this game, full of first day of the season rust and the nerves and knees of an almost 40-year-old icon. With that iconic Keaton look like he was trying to look for something better to say, he tells it like it is..."f#####g boring"!

"Well, Michael, we are live", the reporter replies, as friendly as the pat on the back he receives from Keaton when the other Michael in the arena realizes his gaff. We're all laughing, especially me and my dad, back home who stayed up to the early hours, U.K., to watch what was our first full NBA game, as pops wonders what all the fuss is about...and I can't blame him. It's a beautiful moment of levity, that not only the game, but the city and the world needed, if you look back at the date at the top of this review. But why are we talking about this, beyond that? Eliciting an even bigger smile through chewed gum from Michael was when the reporter (who probably thought this night couldn't get any worse...and we aren't talking about the wax dry snooze-fest on the floor), talked about what he did know about...films. Introducing the great Michael Keaton as the star of 'Beetlejuice'. Not 'Batman', like that other film with reuniting director of the haunting bizarre, Tim Burton. Going nuts in callbacks itself, from 'The Flash' multiverse, to the 'Batgirl' movie we'll never see. But, The Juice, like another sports star from the 90s who had an incredible run.

Keaton has been keyed in over the last few years. When the 'Multiplicity' star hasn't been playing avian superheroes (The Vulture in 'Spider-Man: Homecoming'), or Oscar winning ones ('Birdman', or, the unexpected virtue of an Academy Award for walking around Times Square in your tighty-whities). The 'Spotlight' star has been acting up a storm on small screens ('Dopesick') and big ('The Founder'). But now, as Betelgeuse, he doesn't give up being the ghost with the most in an afterlife full of the depraved that fits him as fine as that black and white striped suit. The joker of this pack, with wild hair, Flecked make-up and panda eyes, is the surprise treat of the year in a calendar of franchises throwing it back like 'Axel F' on Netflix, better known as 'Beverly Hills Cop'. In the first film, he played around for about as much screen-time as Anthony Hopkins in 'The Silence of the Lambs', but you know that won Sir Anthony an Oscar. Now in the cleverly named sequel (REDACTED...we've already said the name twice), Michael bringing his anti-hero out of retirement, back with Burton is exactly what we need this season, like their way of dealing with the selfie obsessed generation. . Especially now it's released in the rising sun too, with Halloween on the horizon.

Even without Geena Davis, or Alec Baldwin (there's a great cameo here...but it's not them), this silly sequel is a slimy slapstick hit. All the way to the poster callback and arms open wide for old friends like Catherine O'Hara. Still a legend and modern day star from 'Home Alone' to 'Schitt's Creek'. Although we all know who the real star of the show is, Winona Ryder. Throwing it back like her 'Stranger Things' series and not looking like it's been almost 40 years, for the love of all things that are holy for this writer born three years before. Speaking of Netflix haunts, 'Wednesday' star Jenna Ortega truly clicks as the new star of this spectacle, with the future name of this franchise on her lips. A scream in this horror comedy, especially when she brings the iconic dancing back in a hall of rogues for a gallery, scripted by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar. Featuring Justin Theroux, showing that Jasper Carrot was right about lifting a ponytail up and finding an a###hole underneath and a stapled together Monica Bellucci. Not to mention all the shrunken, Talking Heads, 'Mask' coloured suits from Burton's brilliant creature feature box of tricks. And an ace Willem Dafoe (giving Japan all 'Kinds Of Kindness' this week), acting as a detective on the closed casket case. So good, they named it twice. Now, if only we could summon and scare up a third film. Now how would we go abo...BEETLEJUICE! TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Further Filming: 'Beetlejuice', 'Wednesday', 'The Flash'.