Ghostbusters in Concert

This week I have been really sick, which in and of itself is not very pleasant, but the bad thing is that I had a lot of plans which all had to be cancelled.  I was especially bummed about missing the Josh Groban concert!  Luckily, I felt much better yesterday and, since I made it through a day of school, I was able to go to the movie Ghostbusters with the score played live by the Utah Symphony.  It was so much fun!  I love the Utah Symphony Films in Concert series and this movie was especially appropriate for Halloween.  I remember loving this movie when I saw it on the big screen during its first run and, while some of the special effects are a little bit dated, it is still comedy gold.  Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Harold Ramis play Peter Venkman, Raymond Stantz, and Egon Spengler, respectively.  They are paranormal psychologists who have recently been fired from Columbia University and, as a result, decide to form the Ghostbusters, a firm which hunts, captures, and disposes of ghosts.  A cellist named Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver) hires them and they discover that her apartment building is a gateway for a supernatural being known as Grozer.  Both Dana and her nerdy neighbor Louis (Rick Moranis) are possessed by Grozer's Gatekeeper and Keymaster and, when an officious EPA officer (William Atherton) shuts down the Ghostbusters and releases all of the ghosts back into the city, Grozer appears.  It takes the form of whatever they choose and Ray inadvertently chooses the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man (the crowd cheered when he appeared on screen) and an epic battle ensues.  The score, composed by Elmer Bernstein, is absolutely dazzling and the symphony performed it brilliantly.  I think hearing the music performed live adds so much to the experience of watching the movie and I highly recommend getting a ticket to tonight's screening (go here for tickets and enter the promo code STAYPUFT for a $5 discount on each ticket).

Note:  As an added bonus, the guest conductor was Peter Bernstein, the son of the composer who also contributed to the score.