"Ghostbusters" (DVD) Release Date: June 29, 1999 MPAA Rating: PG Movie Length: 107 minutes Color/Black&White: Color Closed-Captioned: Yes Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 Format: Widescreen (Enhanced for 16x9 TVs) Languages: English Subtitles: English DVD-Rom Enhanced: Yes Layers: Dual Sides: One Regional Coding: 1 Video Format: NTSC Package Type: Keep Case CTHV Catalog Number: 04139

This ground-breaking DVD release features the most extensive and sophisticated interactive options ever offered on DVD releases from Columbia/Tristar Home Video as of June 29, 1999 (it's original release date). This DVD represents a benchmark in added-value options offered to consumers.

"Live" feature-length Video Commentary
Harold Ramis (writer & actor), Ivan Reitman (director) and Joe Medjuck (producer) were filmed in silhouette, watching the entire film, and commenting on it. The viewer can choose to watch the commentary with their silhouettes pointing and gesturing as they watch the film or listen to their commentary as an extra audio track while watching the movie normally.

Feature-length Production Notes
Columbia/Tristar Home Video has taken the text of the book "Making Ghostbusters" by Don Shay and put it into a subtitle stream, so that the viewer may choose to watch the film with antidotes, trivia and bits of interviews that pertain to particular points in the film.

Three Complete Featurettes:

1. 1984 "The Making Of Ghostbusters" featurette -- With interviews of the cast and crew.
2. 1999 "Star" featurette -- New interviews with Harold Ramis, Ivan Reitman and Dan Aykroyd talking about the origins of Ghostbusters, how it changed their lives and careers, and how their kids like it.
3. 1999 "Meet the Special Effects Team" featurette -- Interviews with more than a dozen of the original visual effects team. Includes original production photos and conceptual art.

Storyboard to Film Comparison
Watch a split-screen side-by-side comparison of three scenes in the film next to their animated original storyboards.

Before and After Special Effects
With the Multiple Angles feature of DVD, the viewer can toggle back and forth between the rought cut and the final cut of the film to see three scenes before and after the final visual effects were added.

Three Still Photo Galleries:

1. More than 50 original pencil and chalk conceptual drawings of ghosts and monsters.
2. Many original storyboards.
3. Hundreds of production photos taken of the special effects team sculpting monsters, creating and destroying sets, and generating animation.

Ten Deleted Scenes:

1. Stake -- Dean Yeager and the Ghostbusters have a longer talk.
2. Dana -- Peter talks to Dana in her apartment.
3. Honeymooners -- The Honeymooners in the Sedgewick Hotel.
4. Winston -- Janine fields some phone calls while Winston fills out a job application.
5. Bums -- Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd as two street bums strolling through Central Park as Louis runs past them.
6. Busy -- Peter and Ray converse with the Mayor on the City Hall Loading Dock while Janine gives Egon her lucky coin.
7. Promotion -- Outside the Shandor Building, Winston shares his doubts about facing Gozer.
8. E.P.A. -- Walter Peck speaks to a cop outside the Shandor Building.
9. Puft Hat -- The Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man's hat falls to the ground.
10. No Louis! -- Louis asks Dana if they did it.

DVD-ROM Enhanced -- Includes the following:

1. Filmographies of cast and crew -- These will be hyperlinked to detail pages of most of the Columbia/Tristar Home Video DVD titles through filmographies with degrees of separation.
2. Original Final Shooting Script -- This will also be hyperlinked to the film so that the viewer may jump from the script to that point in the film in order to compare it to the final partially-improvised film.
3. Web Link -- There will be various links from the DVD-ROM to the Sony website, the Columbia/Tristar Home Video website and the Ghostbusters.Com website.

Three-Dimensional Animated Menus
The main menu is a 3-D view of the Manhattan skyline,with the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man wandering through the buildings. The main menu also has computer rendered animated transitions to the sub-menus.

Four Original Trailers:

1. Ghostbusters
2. Ghostbusters II
3. Groundhog Day
4. Stripes

The "Tricks & Trivia" option on the DVD turns on the production notes subtitles. So, you might have problems with it if you already have the video commentary on.

The following "defects" are part of the DVD:

• After Peter says, "What about the Twinkie?" is where the disc switches from layer 1 to layer 2. So, if your DVD player pauses briefly, this is why. In my opinion, it is quite noticable and very annoying.
• There are some picture flutters at the very top of the picture in the GB1 trailer (beginning library scene) and all throughout the 1984 featurette. This, from what I can tell, is due to the quality of the original sources.
• On some production photos, the words "Production Photos" isn't entirely highlighted when selected.

• DVD Packaging
• Liner Notes Essay
• Press Kit
• Original DVD Materials
• Entertainment Weekly Article -- 06/18/1999

MULTIMEDIA:

• GB1/GB2 15th Anniversary Video/DVD Trailer
  * Flash (Spike) - Streaming / Download (gives url)
  * Flash (Spike) - Streaming / Download (gives url)
  * Flash (EVTV1) - Streaming / Download (EVTV1 logo in lower left corner)

FAN-MADE REPLACEMENT ARTWORK:
(to be printed out and used in the DVD keep case outer sleeve in place of what came with the disc)

• Brian Walker (same images and text as RCA/Columbia VHS) (565 Kb)
• Troy Benjamin (541 Kb)

REVIEWS:

• IGN
• Digital Eyes
• DVD Review
• The Cinema Laser
• Yanman On The Web
• DVD Verdict (archive)
• Remote Central

OUTSIDE LINKS:

• Official Site (alt url)
• "DVD Or Bust: Ghostbusters Breaks The Mold Of Special Features" by Monica James (archive)