11 · 01 · 21

"Who you gonna call?": Jason Reitman Unveiled Honorary Armchair and Presented Ghostbusters: Afterlife

Gustavo R. Gallardo

Filmmaker Jason Reitman presented the film Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021), a film that closes the 19th Morelia International Film Festival (FICM), and unveiled an armchair with his name on it as part of the festival's guest of honor activities.

In the presence of the president of the festival, Alejandro Ramírez, and the founder and general director of the festival, Daniela Michel, the director was recognized by the audience who came to the Teatro Matamoros to see the third part of the saga that his father, director Ivan Reitman, began in the 1980s with Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989).

"For us, it is an honor to close this 19th edition of the festival with a film that is a very important part of the history of cinema, by a director that we greatly admire and that we are very excited to have here in Morelia," said Alejandro Ramírez.

To the sound of applause, Jason Reitman took the stage of the Teatro Matamoros and the president of FICM let him know that, as part of a tradition, a personalized honorary armchair is given to all the special guests, which is then placed in room 4 of Cinépolis Centro.

The Canadian-born filmmaker, director of films like Thank You for Smoking (2005) and the acclaimed Juno (2007), was surprised by the gesture and jumped for joy when he unveiled his armchair.

"Thank you! Thank you very much! This is an incredible honor. I have wanted to come to this festival for many years. Two years ago Morelia was introduced to me, I did not know it, and I found a city with a lot of cultural richness, with many traditions and a great tradition in particular, is within cinema. And it is an honor to be here," said the director.

Then, he thanked Alejandro Ramírez and Daniela Michel, "and thanks to the city of Morelia for making me feel so important on such a special day."

He then talked bout one of the most important traditions in Mexico, the Night of the Dead, to remember Harold Ramis, who appearedin the first two films: "I know this is a very important day in which we remember the people we love and the people we've lost. I want to dedicate tonight to Harold Ramis, one of the original Ghostbusters; it's a movie dedicated to him."

Before leaving the stage, he asked the question that the audience expected: "Who you gonna call?" In unison, the audience responded: Ghostbusters!

The movie is being able to say goodbye to someone you love: Jason Reitman

After the film, the director took a moment with the audience to answer questions and hear comments, including a young man who thanked Reitman and said that after watching Ghostbusters: Afterlife, he became a fan of the saga all over again.

"I made this movie for my father and also for my daughter, for all families. It's a movie for all of us who wanted to be ghostbusters. I never thought I was going to direct the Ghostbusters," he said.

Reitman said that he avoided making this movie for a long time because he couldn't find a story, much less who the new ghostbusters could be. "The story I found is that I myself was afraid of being one of them, then I realized that it would be a personal story of mine."

"I always had my father, the director of the film, sitting next to me on the set. That's very weird, imagine that your parents went to work with you every day. It is quite a challenge, but I had the greatest expert on Ghostbusters sitting next to me," he recalled.

The film director further said that one of the biggest challenges was the car, an adapted 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor: "That car is a character, the car is a ghostbuster and first you had to find the Ectomobile. They only made 100 originally and one is in Mexico, but we needed two more than the one we already had from 1984."

All the scenes in the car, he said, were real, even the most dangerous scenes and the chases, something he confesses, he always wanted to do: "In Juno and my other films we had not been able to do something like that. I am very proud of that part of the movie".

The most exciting part for him was seeing the original actors in the Ghostbusters costume, he said, "it was like witnessing a Beatles reunion."

"We wanted to make a film that was not only about ghosts that are flying from one place to another, but also about the ghosts of the past, about what it feels like when you want to talk to someone who is no longer there and that is the art of the film, because it does not end with an explosion, but with a hug and that is the most important visual effect, because the film is being be able to say goodbye to someone you love," he said, after a person confessed that his father passed away recently and was a follower of the movies.

Jason Reitman said there was something very comforting about feeling that the best Ghostbusters movie that could be made had already been made, “but we were going to tell another chapter, because that's it, it's part of many others and we want there to be more chapters. of the Ghostbusters. In Mexico, they called it Ghostbusters: The Legacy, and I like that title in Spanish,” he said, explaining it has to do with his father's legacy and what he follows.