Ghostbusters

Ghostbusters (1984) was a classic tale of mid-career professional academics who came to a crossroads of sorts in their careers. They had run afoul of that most sacred cow in academia. A sacred cow that was so inviolable that to even question it was to be branded as a heretic and forever cast out of the warm confines of the ivory tower.

What did our intrepid heroes Dr. Peter Venkman, EgonSpangler, Ray Stanz do that so rankled the academic community of Columbia University? They dared expose to the world that ghosts were a very real phenomenon and impossible to ignore.

They set up shop in a derelict fire house and acquired an ancient ambulance to scoot about the City Too Busy To Sleep. But Egon slowly catches wind of a serious spectral problem.

Their problems with the powers that be only amplified as the spectral war ramped up. Civil servants steeped in the cesspool of the early 1980s concrete jungle that was New York City simply did not have time to deal with this supposed spectral war.  

Classic though it may be, director Ivan Reitman made the odd choice to turn a light comedy. A war with ghosts is not a comedy. Existence itself is no laughing matter.