Tag Archives: Rick Moranis

Ghostbusters II (1989) | Ivan Reitman

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Five years after the events of Ghostbusters,  the heroes are zeroes again, bankrupt after getting sued by the city for the destructive aftermath of clearing out the city of spooks. There’s also a Federal restraining order prohibiting them from continued ghostbusting. Peter Venkman (Bill Murray) is now the host of a cheesy local cable talk show called, “World of the Psychic.”  Occult bookstore owner Ray Stantz (Dan Aykroyd) gets side work with Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson), cosplaying as Ghostbusters for childrens’ birthday parties. Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis) is back at Columbia University, investigating how human emotions affect psycho-magnetic energy.  Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver) is a single mother after leaving Venkman for his inability to commit, having a baby, now eight months old, with another man.  Louis Tully (Rick Moranis) applies his knack for accounting to become a tax lawyer.

They reunite after being approached by Peter’s ex, Dana, who reports a strange occurrence involving her baby’s carriage traveling on its own. They discover rivers of mood slime running beneath the city, converging on the Manhattan Museum of Art, where Dana works as an art restorer, including a life-size portrait of Medieval sorcerer warlord, Vigo the Carpathian. Vigo’s spirit lives within his portrait, and to enter into the realm of the living, he needs a baby to be his vessel to come to the mortal realm and continue his reign of terror. He makes a deal with Dana’s boss, Dr. Janosz Poha (Peter MacNicol), to secure her baby, Oscar, in exchange for a date with her.

Ghostbusters (1984) | Ivan Reitman

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Ghostbusters centers on three university researchers (Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Harold Ramis) of paranormal activity who go into business of their own once they get into trouble for their uncouth antics, and their grant money runs out.  They emerge on the scene as the “Ghostbusters”, a trio of exterminators (of sorts), willing to investigate phenomena from anyone in New York City willing to call their number and pay their fees.  Though the public is initially skeptical, these men soon become heroes, then celebrities, for their success rate, drawing the attention of the media, as well as the EPA (who are curious about their containment system), as the amount of ghostly appearances seems to be on a major upswing.

Sigourney Weaver co-stars as a cellist named Dana Barrett, who is one of the first in her old building to begin seeing strange things in her refrigerator, causing her to make the call she never thought she’d have to make.  Along with her neighbor, Louis Tully (Rick Moranis), she becomes the conduit for the rise of the malevolent Babylonian spirit, whose aims are to bring darkness onto the world. Directed by Ivan Reitman.

 

Erratum: The artist friend Aykroyd used for conceptual art on Ghost Smashers was John “The Viking” Deveikis, not the cited Thom Enriquez, who made additional conceptual art once Reitman was on board.

Little Shop of Horrors (1986) | Frank Oz

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Howard Ashman and Alan Menken’s off-Broadway darkly comical stage musical came to life in 1986, directed by Muppet-alum Frank Oz, featuring Rick Moranis, and small roles for Steve Martin, Bill Murray and John Candy.  Ellen Greene co-stars in this story about a 1960s loser who finds success with an exotic plant that makes all his dreams come true, if only he finds a way to keep it fed — with human blood!  Production design and the catchy tunes makes this a favorite musical from the 80s.

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989) | Joe Johnston

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Rick Moranis stars as lovable dad and ambitious college professor Wayne Szalinski, who has recently become something of a laughing stock to his peers when he dares to introduce a potential way to drastically reduce the size of everyday objects.  His own experiments have proved futile, but a fluke accident causes the reduction machine to finally work — too bad the Szalinski children are the ones in the ray’s path, along with the rambunctious neighbor kids, the Thompsons.  Wayne accidentally tosses the kids out with the trash, causing the miniscule kids to have to venture through the entire yard and hope they can grab the attention of their parents, and, hopefully, the professor can figure out a way to grow them back to normal size again.  Making it there proves more difficult than it would seem, with treacherous bugs and other pollutants blocking the way at nearly every turn.