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Melissa McCarthy and Kristen Wiig are two of the actresses in talks to star in a new take on the 80s classic.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, four female comedians will take on the roles of the Ghostbusters, made famous by Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Harold Ramis and Ernie Hudson.
The reboot will be directed by Paul Feig, who also directed Bridesmaids, starring Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy.
Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon, both of Saturday Night Live fame, are also in talks to star in the film which will be set for release in July 2016.
The concept sounds awesome to me.
The thought of the uber funny Melissa raging at a poltergeist with a plasma gun is kind of awesome and exciting, don’t you think?
Of course, there are loads of people on the interwebs who don’t agree.
Dear Paul Feig, Stay the fuck out of my Ghostbusters, you worthless, pandering shitbag. The opposite of love, Gregg
— Motörgregg (@clinteldorado) October 8, 2014Great, Ghostbusters is fucked. With the people who wrote and directed Bridesmaids, I can't help but feel it's gunna be pandering shite. RIP
— Wham Bam Thankya Mam (@bambam13photos) October 12, 2014Lazy Hollywood film making "let's make a ghostbusters remake but with women!" Only soccer moms and feminist bimbos will watch that trash.
— Joel (@JRwrz) January 27, 2015Some of them think that Ghostbusters with women will totes be, like, a complete copy of Charlie’s Angels. Huh?
... and out come the feminists praising there being an all female Ghostbusters cast... Not like it hasn't been done before #CharliesAngels
— Davey T (@GremlinPrince) January 28, 2015Why are they turning the #Ghostbusters franchise into Charlie's Angles? Reboots are crap anyway but think I've already written this one off.
— Matt (@matt_metallica) January 27, 2015And then there are these awesome people:
An all-female Ghostbusters? What's next, an all-male hierarchy perpetuated throughout thousands of years of recorded history?
— Dave Itzkoff (@ditzkoff) January 28, 2015Your childhood hasn't been ruined by a female Ghostbusters movie. Your adulthood has been ruined by misogyny.
— Michele Catalano (@inthefade) January 28, 2015I'm looking forward to months of white guys complaining about Ghostbusters like there's never been a movie focused on a group of men before
— Bailey (@the_author_) January 28, 2015There are hordes of misogynists who are complaining about ruined childhoods and how unnecessary the reboot is. You know what? You’re all wrong.
We really do need this reboot because we need more female leads in Hollywood. Especially black female leads. And we need the women in these films to talk about more than hair and nails or their man troubles. We need the world’s perception of women to change and this is a giant step in the right direction.
Paul Feig has said that the new film will also pay homage to the original and acknowledge the story of the original film, according to Entertainment Wise. Sounds good to me.
Also, how is casting these 4 HILARIOUS women going to ruin Ghostbusters? Is it because they won’t be standing in the kitchen making the ghosts sandwiches, or converting the plasma guns to dust busters so they can really get the firehouse to sparkle? Or is just because there’s still this daft idea that women can’t possibly be funny?
Melissa McCarthy is on fire right now. She’s pumping out movies like nobody’s business and is seriously one of the funniest people on the planet. I mean, have you seen The Heat? Sandra Bullock was funny, but she had nothing on Melissa.
Kristen Wiig has had four Primetime Emmy nods for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her work on SNL which she left in 2012. Since then she’s been in a slew of brilliant comedies (she totally stole the show in Anchorman II) and had the lead in Bridesmaids which was a massive success.
Kate McKinnon is currently a permanent cast member on SNL where she is well-known for her great characters and awesome celebrity impressions. She is also the first openly lesbian cast member which means she’ll also bring some extra diversity to Ghostbusters.
Leslie Jones isn’t as well known as the four other leads, but she’s equally as awesome. At 47, she’s the oldest cast member to join SNL, and her jokes have been met with controversy, but she’s hitting it out the ballpark and, personally, I can’t wait to see what she does with her role as a kick ass ghostbuster.
Let’s just hope she’s not seen as the Token Black Character.
If you watched the movie as a kid or teen, you probably have nostalgic feelings towards it, just like I did before rewatching it last year. And I realised, while the movie is comedy gold, it’s also racist.
Now, before you scroll down to the comments to rant that I don’t know what I’m talking about, let me explain.
There were four Ghostbusters, right? Venkman, Ray, Egon and Winston. Wrong. There were three Ghostbusters and the Token Black Guy. Winston was extremely marginalised and I only realised when I watched the film as a race-aware adult.
While Winston had a few great lines (“Ray, when someone asks you if you're a god, you say ‘YES’!”), the problem was he only had very few lines. In fact, there are quite a few scenes where he isn’t even featured at all, and when he is, he’s almost always standing behind a white person.
Ernie Hudson, the actor who played Winston, was also not featured on the movie poster or featured in the trailer, and has actually spoken about how much his role was cut down and how much that hurt him in this interview with The Guardian. And while Ernie prefers not to blame racism, I think the message that the film sent by treating his character the way they did is a racist one and needs to be addressed.
Hopefully Paul Feig and Katie Dippold, who wrote for Parks and Recreation and The Heat, will take on this issue while still writing an awesome movie with four fantastic female leads.
So, now there’s just one more question we need to ask. Who you gonna call?
The patriarchy.
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