I would really like to thank the hundreds of comments in support of the debut of Parental Guidance. It's nice to share these positive comments with my daughter who is far more important to this column than I am. If you missed the first Parental Guidance, basically, the idea for the column came from me wanting to spend more time with my oldest daughter. I concocted a plan to make my 15 year old daughter, Allie, watch movies of my choice. Thankfully, she was all for it. She's a beautiful, brilliant, cool kid. Yet she needed to beef up her cinematic acumen so to speak. Seriously, read the first column for a much better feel for what Parental Guidance is about.
Besides the positive comments for the first column, one comment stood out. A teenager took umbrage when I said that teens have sucky taste in music and movies normally. Well get over it, kid. 90% of teens have bad taste in music and movies. I counted. It's okay, so did I. I saw Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo IN THE THEATER. People were breakdancing in the aisle for god's sake. I also remember owning the Milli Vanilli CD. So there. Stop your whining about my generalizations about teenagers. There are plenty more coming.
I live in a house with 4 women (wife and 3 daughters for the mathematically disadvantaged) and a toddler-sized natural disaster we named Garrett. Garrett and I had just came in from organizing our barn that we plan to use for storing Walkers after the zombie apocalypse.
As soon as we enter the dining room, I hear my wife and Allie discussing their June "girl's trip" to St. Augustine, Florida. They both love history so I hear them chatting about visiting Castillo de San Marcos, Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine, etc. I'm feeling mighty proud as a husband and a father. Then, I hear my wife say "oooh, we should also go on ghost tours." Immediately, all love of history is seemingly forgotten as I imagine hundreds of dollars being wasted on tour guides with a faulty flashlight screaming out "Did you see that?" roughly every 3 minutes.
Freaking fake ghost tours.
After a failed attempt at suggesting Flagler College and Lightner Museum would be much better than walking around like an idiot looking for imaginary ghosts, inspiration struck me for the 2nd edition of Parental Guidance.
Every week, I will ask Allie a few questions about Allie's knowledge of the movie we are about to see. Each movie we watch will be the first time she's seen the movie.
Allie, have you ever heard of Ghostbusters?
Yes, there is a dance for it on Just Dance 2014!.
This is not starting off well, kiddo. Have you at least heard of Bill Murray?
Yes, Daddy! Bill Murray was in Groundhog Day. I love that movie! "Ned Ryerson? BING!" Oh and he was on Saturday Night Live. I've watched a lot of the old seasons.
Not bad. Not bad. I had forgotten you had seen Groundhog Day and 10 points to Hufflepuff for knowing Ned Ryerson. But it's time to get serious. Do you believe in ghosts? Be honest. Yes, I will mock you.
First of all, I'm Ravenclaw. But yes, I believe in ghosts. Um, have you heard that story Mom tells about when she was living in Japan? Heck yes there are ghosts, old man. Open your eyes!
My wife's bad influence on Allie strikes again.
With that out of the way, we scheduled our viewing of Ghostbusters for the weekend. As part of Parental Guidance, I will also ask Allie a few standard questions to just give you her frame of mind leading into the movie.
What's the last movie you've watched for fun?
I'm not sure if it was for fun, but we saw Romeo and Juliet at school.
Tell us three things you've heard about Ghostbusters.
1. It's about getting rid of ghosts.
2. Bill Murray stars in the movie.
3. I have no other knowledge of this movie besides my Dad asking me who I'm gonna call over and over and over since we decided to watch this movie.
On a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you think you'll like Ghostbusters?
I like ghost stories so I'm hoping it's an 8.
Allie's Random (and I mean Random) Thoughts on Ghostbusters
--When Dana got possessed by Zuul. her eyeliner was pretty good. Not bad for a demon.
--I thought Bill Murray's side comments were hilarious, "Nobody steps on a church in my town!" I plan on seeing every movie he's ever been in.
--When the Ghostbusters all shoot at Zuul's altar thing, the look on the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man's face was priceless. He had a pure look of horror as he became the world's largest s'more. Who thinks they can just go and ruin Stay Puft's plans of destruction like that?
--How does Bill Murray get all the ladies in his movies? What is this madness?!
--I loved how when marshmallow man blows up, all of the ghostbusters are covered in marshmallow goo except Bill Murray. He has to get ready for that kiss with his dog lady.
--There is really only one awkward part in this movie. Hey ghost putting the moves on Dan Aykroyd; I'm watching this with my Dad. GROSS!
Every week I'll ask her a few questions after the movie to get her thoughts.
On a scale of 1 to 10, how much did you like Ghostbusters
If the movie was just Bill Murray, I'd rate it a 7. I love him! It is definitely better than I thought. Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis are really funny as well. I rated it a 9 just on laughter, music, and marshmallow bits.
How old do you think someone should be before watching that movie?
13 seems to be the magic number unless your kid doesn't get scared by demon dogs.
Would you recommend this movie to your friends?
Without a doubt. We're watching this together on Netflix soon!
Dad's Slightly More Focused Synopsis
Whatever I wrote here originally, I have now deleted due to the unfortunate passing of Harold Ramis (Egon). That day, I was at work discussing the brand new Ghostbusters Funko Pops with my friend. We were looking at the pics and discussing how cool these "collectibles" (adult term for toys) were and that we we were definitely buying them. At some point, I looked at my Facebook feed and saw the Cinema Blend story about Harold Ramis's death and whatever positives that day had were gone. We had lost Egon dammit.
Ramis brought laughs with an eyebrow, a nod, or even a blank expression. More importantly, he gave us laughter with his writing. When I got home that day, I told Allie the news about his passing and she was sad. She made a comment that she hadn't said anything about Egon in her review but that he was awesome. I told her that's how I thought Harold Ramis wanted his acting viewed. He wasn't trying to be the superstar. He was the guy on screen that made you laugh even when you didn't realize it. We decided to watch Ghostbusters again that night. This time with the entire family of 6. We all agreed that the world needed a lot more Harold Ramis than it got.
