‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’ Slays at Venice Premiere

Chris Gardner and Scott Roxborough
·2 min read
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Tim Burton couldn’t have wished for a better return from the dead.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the 36-years-in-the-waiting sequel to Burton’s 1988 cult horror-comedy hit, was greeted with a warm standing ovation at this year’s Venice Film Festival from the crowd upon its world premiere on Wednesday night.

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As the audience applauded for a nearly four-minute standing ovation, the cast joined together in the balcony for bows as Burton clutched his girlfriend, Monica Bellucci. He then led the team to exit the theater together. Dafoe and Theroux went to the stairs first, followed by Ryder and Ortega who sat next to one another. As Warner Bros. chiefs Pam Abdy and Michael DeLuca exited behind the cast, they accepted congratulations and Abdy was overheard telling festival director Alberto Balbero “thank you for having us.”

Critics have also embraced Burton’s sequel as a welcome return to form. In his review, The Hollywood Reporter‘s lead critic David Rooney said Burton, “a director with a love for the macabre, finds new life in death,” with stars Winona Ryder and Michael Keaton helping the director “rediscover the ghoulish mischief of his glory days.” Several times during the film, Rooney says he scribbled, “Tim Burton’s back!” in his notes.

The response has been broadly similar across the board, with the BBC calling Beetlejuice Beetlejuice “a gleefully zany farce packed with knock-out punchlines and great practical effects” and Empire magazine praising Keaton’s reprisal of his eponymous role as the mischievous demon. “Michael Keaton has never been Beetlejuicier.” Britain’s Guardian gave a rare pan, writing “Burton’s game attempt to bring the 1980s horror-comedy back from the spirit world is full of gaudy set-pieces but fails to add much to the original.”

Speaking ahead of the premiere in Venice, Burton said he felt “re-energised” by the film, after a number of years in which “I got a little bit disillusioned with the movie industry, [I sort] of lost myself.”

If the reaction in Venice is any indication, Burton most definitely is back. Warner Bros. will be pleased. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is already tracking to open as high as $80 million at the domestic box office when it drops in theaters on Sept. 6. The juice, it seems, truly is loose.

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