This is gonna make E.T. look like Raiders of the Lost Ark

September 9, 2020 1:17 AM

Dan Aykroyd and Bill Murray shot a short film for independent theatre owners to sell them on showing Ghostbusters (Twitter video). Features an original (bad) theme song!
posted by adrianhon (12 comments total)

Twitter drama! Here is the full unedited version. I don't know why there was an edited version. Full 80s! Coca Cola buying Columbia references! "Makes ET look like Raiders of the Lost Ark!" Unreleased Ghostbusters theme! The Internet might explode.

Also this copy looks fantastic for being hidden away for 36 years. I would love to hear the story behind this and presumably other films like it.
posted by geoff. at 1:42 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

Oh wow, thanks for that, geoff. – hot off the presses! Wish I'd seen that longer YouTube version before posting.
posted by adrianhon at 1:52 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

I love to see Bill Murray crack up when Aykroyd says the movie is "fuckin' PG".
posted by Servo5678 at 4:52 AM on September 9, 2020 [6 favorites]

In case you are reading this thread and were "meh" on the 2 minute edit, the 3:49 edit does not add a lot except a few extra lame jokes from Aykroyd / Murray, including at least one cringy joke about hookers coming to your room.

Was this kind of promo appeal a common thing for marketing a movie? Were they all so awful? The "fuckin PG" line is the only one that even sorta lands. I guess if you loved Aykroyd and Murray as stars you might be a tiny bit excited they're talking to you? Bonus points that in this moment of filming promos they both weren't too coked up to be coherent.

Sorry to be so negative but.. The movie is so great and has such wonderful energy. WTF is this? Maybe some cocaine woulda helped.
posted by Nelson at 7:27 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

Saw Ghostbusters in the theater with my mom, dad and brothers. I was around 12 years old. I distinctly remember my serious-minded, bookworm, military father laughing out loud at Murray's line in the film (paraphrased) "That's right, this man has no dick" and it was an actual, fun point in my childhood where I first started seeing my parents as real human beings.

Our whole family very much enjoyed this flick, and I still really like it to this day. This short film is pretty weird, though. And I'm extremely happy that they didn't use THIS song in the movie.
posted by SoberHighland at 7:40 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

Going with this theme song would have spared Ray Parker Jr. from getting sued by Huey Lewis. It's got a National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation "Holiday Road" feel to it. I like it.
posted by emelenjr at 7:43 AM on September 9, 2020

I never heard of the ray Parker, Jr./Huey Lewis lawsuit! The Ghostbusters theme does kinda sound like I Want a New Drug, now that I think of it, but I never put the two together. I was THE target demographic for both songs and the movie though. I do remember Huey Lewis being non-stop ubiquitous during that era. His music was everywhere, and so was the Ghostbusters song. My little brother even had a pair of Huey Lewis (knockoff) sunglasses... THOSE sunglasses, mirrored, with the stripe.
posted by SoberHighland at 7:50 AM on September 9, 2020

As an imaginary 1980s independent theater owner, I am not really sold here on this "Ghost Busters".
posted by BigHeartedGuy at 11:14 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

Pitch reels are the best, and if you haven't seen the Muppet Show pitch it's time to watch it now.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 11:19 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

Rob Reiner did a similar short film before the release of Spinal Tap. (Looks like whoever posted this might have pulled it from the same crazy CD-ROM release of the movie that I saw it on 20 years ago.)
posted by Inkslinger at 11:31 AM on September 9, 2020 [1 favorite]

(Tom Breihan just recently covered Parker's "Ghostbusters" in his "The Number Ones" column on Sterogum.)
posted by maxwelton at 12:00 PM on September 9, 2020

Note to Paul Feig, this is how you do improv. As a silly pitch clip for cinemas. Not as like 70% of an entire film. More comedy here in 2 minutes (even the jokes that don't quite land, because you know they're just riffing) than the entire remake.
posted by Chickenring at 2:38 PM on September 9, 2020