SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
It's been 36 years since Hollywood let loose a trickster demon named Beetlejuice.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BEETLEJUICE")
MICHAEL KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) It's showtime. Now, let's turn on the juice and see what shakes loose.
DETROW: The 1988 horror comedy proved Michael Keaton could play pretty much anything and made Tim Burton a bankable director. Now they are back with other members of the original cast for a sequel called "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice." Critic Bob Mondello seems to have found it vaguely haunting.
BOB MONDELLO, BYLINE: You know how some movies just speak to you?
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE")
KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) Please, Bob.
MONDELLO: Well, this one certainly has its moments.
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KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) Can't you see I'm concentrating here?
MONDELLO: For instance, practical visual effects really appeal to me, and the original had them, partly because digital effects weren't a thing yet. Today, with everything CGI, Tim Burton getting back to trick-or-treat scares feels pleasantly nostalgic.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) You're a figment of my imagination.
KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) Really? Is this a figment of your imagination?
MONDELLO: The story more or less follows the old one. The Deetz family still owns that haunted house on a hill. Lydia Deetz, Winona Ryder's goth teen, is now a goth TV psychic...
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WINONA RYDER: (As Lydia Deetz) The living, the dead - can they co-exist?
MONDELLO: ...Who is now a goth mom with a disaffected daughter of her own.
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JENNA ORTEGA: (As Astrid Deetz) Ghosts aren't real.
MONDELLO: ...Who will, of course need rescuing from ghosts, leading Lydia to summon the afterlife's least reliable demon.
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RYDER: (As Lydia Deetz) I can't believe I'm doing this. Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice.
KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) I'm needed upstairs. Bob, hold down the fort.
MONDELLO: Will do. Michael Keaton is more covered in moss than last time but seems otherwise unchanged, still carrying a torch for Lydia.
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KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) Long-distance relationships can be difficult, especially when one of you is dead and the other's ignoring it for 30 years. But Lydia and I, we have a definite psychic connection.
MONDELLO: They're joined by Catherine O'Hara as Lydia's stepmom...
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CATHERINE O'HARA: (As Delia Deetz) What?
MONDELLO: ...Always uncanny...
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O'HARA: (As Delia Deetz) Why?
MONDELLO: ...Now otherworldly.
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O'HARA: (As Delia Deetz) No. No. No.
RYDER: (As Lydia Deetz) What's wrong?
O'HARA: (As Delia Deetz) I'm trying to capture the perfect primal scream. I'm going to blow it up, mount it on the wall, and I invite all of you to do the same.
MONDELLO: There are some nifty visual bits, like Monica Bellucci stitching her own body parts together in the afterlife's lost and found so she can do her thing...
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) She's a soul sucker.
KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) You can say that again.
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MONDELLO: ...And a backstory about her...
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KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) My ex-wife is back.
MONDELLO: ...Provided in a black-and-white film trailer in Italian...
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UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character, speaking in Italian).
MONDELLO: ...Along with musical riffs, puppets and worms, and a personal fave, Shrunken Head Bob. In short, it's pretty clear Tim Burton and company are enjoying retracing their steps. And if you have a soft spot for the first "Beetlejuice," you probably will too. Still, as much fun as Michael Keaton seems to be having revisiting past glories, both here and as Batman in last year's "Flash," this film is so unsurprising and un-edgy that it's hard to imagine there will be much call for conjuring him and his pals back for a third "Beetlejuice" anytime soon.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE")
KEATON: (As Beetlejuice) Bob, you and the boys stand guard. Nobody gets through.
MONDELLO: Maybe in another 36 years. I'm Bob Mondello.
DETROW: On tomorrow's show, I talk to director Tim Burton about that movie and about a career that has brought us Batman, Jack Skellington and Edward Scissorhands. I asked him about all the constants through his films.
TIM BURTON: Well, I mean, I - look. You know, everybody keeps - the loner, the out - you know, and I thought I sort of kind of grew out of it. But the thing is you don't grow out of that stuff, you know. Once you feel those feelings, you always feel the same way. And I was - never felt like a proficient-enough filmmaker that I could change my stuff. You know, I mean, my drawings look like my drawings, you know, nothing I can do about it.
DETROW: That conversation on tomorrow's ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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