- Directed by Ivan Reitman
- Written by Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis
- Stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 48 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weIqC-oUGmA
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This was a pretty good but not quite as good sequel to the original, with the same cast plus a few extra folks. In the five years since, things have settled down to normal, but they quickly go haywire again. Good thing The Ghostbusters still know their stuff.
Synopsis
Five years later, Dana walks home with her baby, but the stroller has a mind of its own, rolling through traffic down the streets of New York. Who is she gonna call? Credits roll.
The Ghostbusters show up to a call, but it’s just a kids’ birthday party. They all boo because they wanted He-Man. Yes, the Ghostbusters have gone out of business, but now they do public appearances and dance to their famous song. They were heroes, but they’ve been sued into the ground since then.
Dana goes to see Egon about her stroller problem. Egon still works with Ray from time to time, but they all tend to avoid Peter nowadays. Peter’s the host of a “Psychic” TV show where he makes fun of people who predict the end of the world. Jack Hardemeyer, the mayor’s assistant, doesn’t want the mayor associated with any of the Ghostbusters.
Meanwhile, at the art museum, Dr. Janosz Poha oversees Dana, who is restoring artwork. They wheel in a creepy painting with a scary guy on it. Janosz is a creepy little guy with a foreign accent, and he’s got a crush on Dana. We see the face in the painting struggling to get out. Peter goes to visit Ray and Egon, and he learns about Dana’s little problem.
The three guys head over to Dana’s place to check out the baby. We see that Dana and Peter had a thing for a while, but he wasn’t cut out for that. They don’t find anything special with the baby or the apartment, but they find some slime outside in the road. They dig a hole to see what’s down there; they find a whole river of slime down there. The guys are soon arrested for causing a power blackout.
Back at the museum, the painting of Vigo, the Scourge of Carpathia, comes to life and attacks Janosz. “Find me a child that I might live again.” Janosz’s first stop is Dana’s house.
Hardemeyer is pressing charges against the three Ghostbusters, and Winston and Louis are there in court to help. They’re found guilty on all charges and sentenced to prison. The judge is so angry that it sets off the ectoplasm sample they had for evidence. The judge soon changes his tune and dismisses the charges. The guys suit up and go after the ghosts– they’re back!
Which is good, because things are creeping all around the city again. We get a musical ghostbusting montage! The slime under the city is psychoactive- it responds to human emotional states– it feeds on “bad vibes.”
Peter goes to see Dana at work and meets Janosz, who is still weird. Peter mocks the painting of Vigo, a lunatic and genocidal maniac. She mentions that she’s creeped out by the painting, and later that night, her bathtub tries to eat her baby.
Ray researches Vigo, and there was a whole story about how he ended up dying. Vigo, of course, swore to return someday. The guys go to the museum and Peter asks Janosz about his weird accent, but he’s just from the upper west side. The painting does something to Ray.
Janine and Louis come over to babysit Oscar while Peter and Dana go out. Egon and Ray analyze the painting, and there’s something supernatural about it.
Egon, Ray, and Winston go down into the sewers to check out the slime they saw before and they run into some bad stuff, including many severed heads and a whole phantom subway train. They all soon end up in the slime river, which leads right to the museum. They go to tell Peter, and the whole group is arrested.
The Ghostbusters go to tell the mayor about what’s going on. He wants nothing to do with them and tells Hardemeyer to handle it. He has them committed.
Back at the museum, Vigo and Janosz come to an arrangement about Dana and Oscar. Dana goes home to find that Oscar has been abducted by a ghost-nanny. Dana recognizes that the nanny is Janosz and runs to the museum. As soon as she goes inside, the whole museum becomes covered in slime.
Weird stuff starts happening all over town. The mayor wants to call the Ghostbusters; he has no idea that Hardemeyer had them locked in the psychiatric ward. “Somebody get me the Ghostbusters!”
The Ghostbusters show up at the museum. Inside, Janosz says they’re mainly waiting for midnight, and then the city will belong to Vigo. Janosz wants Dana, but she’s not interested.
The Ghostbusters shoot the slime surrounding the museum, but it won’t budge. Only the good vibes of the citizens of New York will do the job. They go to the Statue of Liberty and wire her up with loudspeakers and lots of slime. Then they “drive” the animated, activated Lady Liberty through town. Meanwhile, Janine gets Louis dressed up as a Ghostbuster.
The Ghostbusters break through the roof of the museum and drop in, just before midnight. They hose down Janosz with good slime, but Vigo is gone from his painting. He appears before the group, and they blast him, which bounces back against the guys.
Vigo has the Ghostbusters paralyzed, and he’s just about to possess Oscar, but he hears all the people outside singing, which saps his powers. Outside, Louis arrives and zaps the ectoplasm outside; this time it works. Vigo possesses Ray but a blast of good slime solves that. The guys shoot the painting, which explodes.
Everyone goes outside to greet the cheering mob.
Commentary
Who’s going to put the Statue of Liberty back where it belongs? Better yet, how?
Max Von Sydow did the voice for Vigo, as the original German actor’s accent was too strong.
It’s a good continuation, but it all seems very low-stakes and a little slower paced until the very end.