Director: Tim Burton.
Starring: Michael Keaton, Geena Davis, Alec Baldwin, Jeffrey Jones, Winona Ryder, Catherine O’Hara, Sylvia Sidney. USA 1988. 92 mins. Colour.
Tim Burton’s enjoyably shlocky haunted house comedy sides with the ghosts when a quaintly idyllic New England farmhouse is taken over after the death of its owners by a horrible yuppie family who install avant-garde art and camp interior designs. Ignored by all but the daughter of the newcomers, the recently deceased turn to Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton), a manic, gross freelance of the underworld who works as an anti-exorcist, ridding houses of unwelcome humans. Terrific performance by Keaton and superb, if over-inventive sight gags and effects.
