GHOSTBUSTERS: FROZEN EMPIRE Director Gil Kenan Talks How He Pitched the Film Idea to Ivan Reitman

Ghostbusters: The Frozen Empire opened this weekend, and while it wasn’t the most well-received Ghostbusters movie there’s ever been, it was still a great time at the theater with a lot of fun and a lot of fan service. The film was directed by Gil Kenanwho co-wrote rebooted Ghostbusters: Afterlife with Jason Reitmann, who directed that film. Reitman was famously the son of the director of the franchise Ivan Reitmann, who directed the first two films. Ivan died two years ago and Frozen empire it was dedicated to him, but he heard about the film before he died, and Kenan recalls being able to pitch the idea to him.

In a recent interview with Comicbook, Kenan spoke about his roots in the franchise’s fandom, saying:

“I can’t tell you how meaningful it was to make Afterlife as a co-writer with his son, Jason Reitman, who brought that film to the screen so beautifully as a director. I had a front row seat to that process as a writer, as a participant to that creative process. And, as a director, it changed my life as a fan. I mean, I saw the first Ghostbusters as one of my first big movies. Uh, my dad took me to see it when I was a kid and he completely left me speechless. I remember exactly where I sat for Ghostbusters 2 in a movie theater in the San Fernando Valley. When Bill Murray’s Peter Venkman character says you couldn’t go anywhere, you could have caught it. The beautiful San Fernando Valley and all the audiences they started exploding in applause. And I remember as a kid looking around like you idiots, making fun of us. And, so, as an outsider, as a fan, I was so incredibly honored to be able to sit at the table in a creative way to tell the next chapter of these stories with Afterlife.”

He continued by talking about the possibility of becoming a director and of having proposed the idea for this film to Ivan Reitman:

“And as the movie was taking shape, Jason and I started having conversations on our own about what the next step in this journey would be and how the story would go. And we started having these ideas that started to feel exciting. and those ideas started to take shape to the point that a few weeks before the afterlife opened, we went from Montecito to Ivan’s house and sat down and told him the story of Frozen Empire. We presented the entire three-act structure of this movie and we received the warmest welcome, his blessing, his confirmation of the direction that we wanted to take these characters and this franchise in. And so there was wind in our sails to make this movie, and Ivan’s voice, the His presence, his brilliance was always there with us during the making of this film. So it’s fitting that this film ends with his name. And that he gets the producer credit he deserves.”

In the story, New York City finds itself frozen by an ancient artifact that unleashes an evil force! Furthermore, the original. In the film, “the Spengler family returns to where it all began – the iconic New York firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who have developed a top-secret research lab to take ghost eradication to the next level. superior. But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, the old and new Ghostbusters must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

The film is now in theaters.