Review: Michael Keaton lets his freak flag fly in his funniest role yet in ‘Beetlejuice’

The fall movie season is in full swing with Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, which is now in theaters after opening the elegant, sentimental Venice Film Festival. The sequel feels possessed by Tim Burton’s 1988 original, which is exactly how it should feel. Not everything worked 36 years ago. And there are some tough moments this time around, too. But what works, works like a gangbuster.

What a treat to welcome Michael Keaton back in his funniest role yet as Betelgeuse (pronounced Beetlejuice), a chatty, rotting corpse and demonic trickster who makes a hilarious play of being utterly disgusting. The first film won an Oscar for makeup, but nothing for Keaton, which shows the Academy’s lack of respect for comic acting. Keaton’s Beetlejuice is an all-time hit.

Winona Ryder also returns in top form as Lydia Deetz, a former goth teen who now hosts a reality show about haunted houses and how to keep them away. Lydia has a daughter of her own, Astrid, played wonderfully by Jenna Ortega, star of Burton’s TV hit, Wednesday. Astrid thinks her mom is crazy, but we don’t doubt their love for a second.

The wonderful Catherine O’Hara also returns as Delia, Lydia’s cruel stepmother. But the heart of the plot, conceived by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, is how Lydia will deal with Beetlejuice, who is still angry that teenage Lydia left him at the altar three decades ago. It seems that our favorite devil needs to marry a human in order to truly torture other people on Earth.

Got it? Whatever. The fun is in the interactions, which begin when the Deetz family gathers at their haunted house in Winter River, Connecticut, to mourn the death of a family member. No spoilers, except to say that this sequel packs more punch than the original ever intended.

There are also a lot of laughs. A lot of laughs with surprising visual jokes that dazzle and delight. The plot begins when Beetlejuice is summoned from the afterlife by someone who repeats his name three times.

Suddenly, there he is, a bio-exorcist from the corridors of Hell, dealing with his vengeful ex-wife Delores (a knockout Monica Bellucci) as she staples her severed body parts together while the Bee Gees sing “Tragedy.” Burton is back, baby!

Just wait until you see their romance summarized as a badly dubbed black-and-white Italian film. The visual jokes are constant. And original composer Danny Elfman provides a soundtrack you can bounce to. And keep an eye out for the ghostly detective who used to be a B-movie actor. It’s a role that lets Willem Dafoe run wild. All the technical credits are aces, especially Harris Zambarloukos’s camera magic, Colleen Atwood’s fabulously eccentric costumes, and songs that reach peak hilarity when the cast lip-syncs to Richard Harris’s butchered “MacArthur Park.”

Praise also goes to the practical effects, which outnumber all the usual digital pyrotechnics. Burton makes everything feel handmade, and that’s irresistible.

Among my complaints (you knew this was coming) I would have to mention the movie being overloaded with subplots. Lydia has a disgusting ponytailed boyfriend played by Justin Theroux, and Astrid dates another Dostoyevsky fan (Arthur Conti). The most unforgivable sin is that Keaton is reduced to just 17 minutes of screen time, but damn, he makes every minute count.

Ultimately, though, it all comes down to Beetlejuice letting his freak flag fly. And he does. As the man says, “Juice is free.” Act accordingly.