Ghostbusters' SFX Team Featurette

The Ghostbusters DVD was one of the earliest to feature the kind of extra's we now take for granted. Amongst the plethora of goodies this reunion of the effects team is probably the least impressive. They managed to get all of them back together, only to place them on a bench against a brick wall. Richard Edlund introduces the old BOSS films team, most of whom rattle off their resume. Not all of them get an anecdote in, some being way too camera shy. When things really started to get boring, director Anita Holly cuts to some old behind the scenes footage of Peter Venkman and Ray Stantz talking about the thermal nuclear accelerator on their backs.

Interesting facts include: Slimer (no more than a green peanut in some shots) was inspired by Bluto from Animal House. They chopped up a hundred model police cars and converted them into Marchmellow Man scale taxis and fire trucks, yet none of them moved. Peewee Herman and Grace Jones were both considered for Gozer the Carpathian. Harder to imagine (but proved by original storyboards) is that John Candy was originally cast as Louis Tully. I am not quite sure why these effects people talk so much about casting. It's a nice little segment on the DVD, but on it's own just shy of a few hilariously shaped explosions. Still, this way it reaches more people than if they had made these people record an audio commentary.

5 out of 10