Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

Image courtesy of Warner Bros.

Overstuffed is one word I'd use to describe Tim Burton's "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice," but amusing is another. It's one of many sequels in recent years that I'm not sure necessarily needed to exist - but now that it does, there's enough to recommend it.

Not quite picking up where the original film left off - hell, it's been 36 years - the film finds Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder) with her own TV show called "Ghost House" in which she investigates haunted places and a daughter, Astrid (Jenny Ortega), who thinks little of her. Lydia's stepmother, Delia (Catherine O'Hara), has become a gallery owner and artist and, at the film's beginning, Delia's husband has died in a plane crash (well, sort of). 

Meanwhile, Lydia's smarmy boyfriend and producer, Rory (Justin Theroux), is laying it on thick for Lydia in hopes that she'll agree to marry him. When Lydia - with Rory and Astrid in tow- come home for the funeral of her father, all hell - and this includes Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton) - breaks loose.

There's also a subplot in which Astrid meets a seemingly shy boy who invites her over for a Halloween party but has a secret, and Lydia must come to her rescue. This leads most of the film's cast to the world of the dead, where Beetlejuice strikes a deal with Lydia that if she'll agree to marry him, he'll help with her daughter. At the same time, Beetlejuice is trying to escape a past flame (Monica Bellucci), who sucks the souls of the dead. 

So, yeah, a little overstuffed. But there are a lot of sight gags and often surprisingly icky special effects to keep viewers' eyeballs popping. There's an amusing thread involving a Beetlejuice flunky named Bob, who is left in charge while Beetlejuice goes off with Lydia for their mission. There's also a police inspector - who's actually a movie star (yeah, it's a little confusing) - played by Willem Defoe who is chasing down the various undead cases involved in the film's plot.

Not surprisingly, "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice" is often a feast for the eyes. This is Tim Burton's best film to look at in some time. The special effects in this one seem less CGI than some of his other endeavors of recent years and look more homespun as they were in the 1988 original.

Not everything here works. There are several moments, mostly having to do with music, that I could have done without - namely, a series of soul train sequences that seem to exist solely to have extended dance scenes in the picture, a children's a cappella choir rendition of "Banana Boat (Day-O)" that might have you shaking your head rather than nodding it, and a sing-a-long to almost the entire damn running length of Richard Harris' "Macarthur Park" (seriously, don't ask).

Otherwise, "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice" is an amusing enough sequel with a spirited reprisal by Keaton of his star-making role as well as some solid supporting work by Ryder, Ortega, and O'Hara. Also, it's nice to once again see Burton working with props and handmade effects than the digital ones that have populated his more recent work. This is one of his more successful recent ventures.