Josh Reviews Cleanin’ Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters!
Cleanin’ Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters is a feature-length documentary on the making of the original 1984 Ghostbusters. It was written, directed, and produced by Anthony & Claire Bueno. It was originally released in 2019, and it’s available to stream, for rental or purchase, on Amazon Prime Video right now!
It’s absolutely wonderful, a true delight for fans like me who love Ghostbusters! It’s a completely professional-looking documentary, well-shot and well-edited, and it is joyously in-depth. It’s a far better product than the various meager special features that have been on the various DVD and blu-ray releases of Ghostbusters over the year. And it’s superior than the grating, too-wacky Ghostbusters episode of The Movies that Made Us. Ghostbusters definitely deserves a fully in-depth making-of documentary, and this is it!
It’s been fun, over the years, seeing fans sometimes step up to fill the void when the studios drop the ball on great special features, and shine a spotlight on the films they love. These efforts can be hit or miss, but in some cases, such as Never Surrender: A Galaxy Quest Documentary, the result is top-notch. Cleanin’ Up the Town definitely falls into that category. There are a few moments in the opening that felt a bit amateurish (that this British production only used British news reports in that opening section stuck out to me), but immediately I was sucked into the doc, and impressed at how well it was put together.
Anthony & Claire Bueno managed to assemble pretty much everyone you could possibly want to participate in a Ghostbusters documentary! The only key players who didn’t participate are Bill Murray and Rick Moranis (neither of whom is a shock, because it’s rare to see either of them participate in any type of making-of documentary). We get to hear from stars Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Ernie Hudson, and Annie Potts; from director Ivan Reitman; from supporting players like William Atherton (who played Walter Peck), David Margulies (who played the Mayor), Alice Drummond (who played the librarian in the opening scene), and even the actors who played the two college students getting tortured by Venkman when we first meet him — that’d be Steven Tash and Jennifer Ruynon (who sadly just recently passed away). We also get to hear from a delightfully wide array of the talented behind-the-scenes crafts-people who made the movie possible! This made me so happy — I loved seeing these talented artists, whose work was so critical to the success of Ghostbusters, given their due.
(This film was released in 2019, but it looks like the interviews were filled well before that. It’s pleasant seeing these younger-versions of these many famous people, and most importantly it’s wonderful that Harold Ramis and Ivan Reitman are featured so heavily, as both have sadly passed away.)
I’m familiar with many of the stories of the making of this movie, but this documentary was filled with story after story that was brand new and interesting to me!! (And even some of the familiar stories were well-told here, too!) We get to hear Mr. Reitman, Mr. Aykroyd, and Mr. Ramis talk about the development of the story and script and the process of transforming Mr. Aykroyd’s wild original treatment into the movie we all know and love. We get to hear about the fight for the title — it turns out that Filmation had the rights to the title Ghostbusters, so for a while they had to record different versions of scenes using names other than Ghostbusters. (We get to see different takes of the Ghostbusters TV ad, with the guys saying different names at the end.) We get to see the development of the iconic logo, which I was surprised to learn was described in Mr. Aykroyd’s script. (I loved seeing several alternate sketches of the logo.) We hear stories of the casting — and we even get to see other actress’ screen tests for Dana Barrett, such as Denise Crosby!! (Ms. Crosby went on to play Tasha Yar in Star Trek: The Next Generation — what we see of her screen test is pretty good!) I’d heard that John Candy was originally supposed to play Louis Tully (the role filled by Rick Moranis), so it’s fun to hear about what went down there (and to see some storyboards showing Mr. Candy as Louis). I’d heard that Ernie Hudson’s character’s role was much larger in an earlier draft of the screenplay, which Mr. Hudson confirms. It’s sad to hear Mr. Hudson describe how he only learned how significantly his role had been cut down just a day or so before filming began. Wow, that is rough. Mr. Hudson admirably is rather even-keeled about the whole thing in his interview segments, though one can tell how upsetting that was for him.
We also get lots and lots of wonderful stories of the creation of the film’s many special effects, overseen by Richard Edlund (who won academy awards for visual effects for the original 1977 Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark) and animation supervisor Terry Windell. I loved hearing about the development of the iconic look of the proton beams, which the special effects guys described (correctly, in my view!) as the signature look of Ghostbusters. I loved seeing the many design concepts for Slimer (and learning that all the effects and productions guys called that ghost “onionhead”). I was fascinated to hear sound designer Richard Beggs detail the creation of the iconic sound of Ecto One’s sirens (one of the many, many visual and sonic choices that helped make Ghostbusters so distinct and memorable).
And, of course, we get lots of amazing stories from throughout the film’s production! I enjoyed the way the documentary was structured, arranging the stories and interviews to basically take us through the film from start to finish. That worked very well. I loved hearing about what it was like filming in the New York public library (as well as the LA public library, which apparently they used for many of the interior scenes). It was interesting to hear about how they found the iconic firehouse HQ, which was also a New York exterior matched with an interior filmed in LA. I loved hearing the editor describe how and why he created the memorable mid-movie montage of magazine covers, interspersed with footage of the Ghostbusters running all around the city. I have often wondered how on earth they managed to film the film’s climax on the streets of New York — the documentary gives me all the stories I wanted, with everyone still seeming to be amazed they were allowed to cause enormous traffic snarls across NYC for days. (They also, it seemed, recreated the exterior of Dana’s building on a stage in LA, where they could do all the stuff like the street cracking open and swallowing the police car.)
I could go on forever describing the wonderful stories contained in this doc. I was astonished that the maid’s “what the hell are you doin’?” reaction to the guys’ first use of the proton packs was that actress’ honest reaction to the scene. I loved hearing William Atherton talk about his decision to play Walter Peck “like Antigone”. I smiled hearing actor David Margulies, who was so wonderful as the mayor, give Bill Murray credit for the perfectly New York idea that the mayor and the cardinal would have been buddies.
I’ve only scratched the surface of the pleasures of this documentary. If you’re a fan of Ghostbusters, give it a watch! (Apparently, the Buenos are also at work on a sequel, exploring the making of Ghostbusters 2. The last news article seems to have been from several years ago, so maybe this has hit a wall. But I hope it eventually happens!!) Cleanin’ Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters is available to stream, for rental or purchase, on Amazon Prime Video right now!
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