Warner Bros. Entertainment · The Geffen Film Company · Q65557474 · 92 min
Box office
$73.7M worldwide on a $15M budget
Honors
Academy Awards — 1 win, 1 nominationKids' Choice Award — 1 nominationAll 1 wins · 2 nominations on record
Academy Awards: Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Scholarship
Named in the title of 10 peer-reviewed works
Examples
Beetlejuice, 2006
Cosa Nostra #33 – BeetleJuice — Institutional Repository of the National University Open and Distance UNAD (Universidad Nacional Abierta y a Distancia), 2024
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice may have problems – but it’s Tim Burton’s best film in years, 2024
Sources: Wikidata · OpenAlex. The record of the motion picture, not an assessment of this cell.
FILM NOTES
Beetlejuice arrived in 1988 from Warner Bros., directed by Tim Burton in only his second feature, following the modest success of Pee-wee's Big Adventure. Its blend of gothic set design, practical effects, and dark comic sensibility marked a turning point for Burton and for mainstream horror-comedy, establishing a visual language he would return to throughout his career. The film's success helped launch an animated series and cemented Michael Keaton's manic performance as one of the era's defining comic turns, while Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin's grounded portrayal of the Maitlands gave the story its emotional center.
This cell brings together the three central figures of the story: the mischievous bio-exorcist Beetlejuice alongside Barbara and Adam Maitland, the recently deceased couple trying to reclaim their home. Pairing the chaotic trickster with the quiet, well-meaning ghosts captures the film's core dynamic, comedy colliding with sincerity. For collectors, a frame uniting these three is prized precisely because it represents the whole ensemble in one piece of film, a compact record of the picture's defining relationship and tone.
Authentication Findings8 checks
Consistent with a 35mm colour positive theatrical release print of Beetlejuice (1988).
Gauge
35mm, confirmed by four perforations per frame on both edges; the strip holds two complete frames and portions of a third.
Perforations
Four per frame on both edges; spacing appears even and the punched edges look clean with no torn or missing perforations visible.
Soundtrack
A variable-area optical track is visible running as a narrow band along one edge, consistent with a dual-bilateral or single variable-area format; no Dolby Digital inter-perforation data blocks, DTS timecode stripe, or SDDS outer-edge tracks are discernible.
Edge print
Not visible in this capture at sufficient resolution to read manufacturer codes or key numbers clearly.
Base & colour
The base shows a warm cream-to-amber tint typical of an acetate safety stock; the dye image reads as a colour positive with no obvious red shift or significant fading.
Projection history
Light longitudinal scratching is visible across the picture area, consistent with a print that has passed through a projector gate.
Picture
Positive colour image; the frames appear to be consecutive frames from a single continuous shot, and the visible content is consistent with the theatrical release of the film on record.
Era check
The variable-area optical soundtrack, acetate base tint, and colour positive stock are all consistent with a 35mm theatrical release print from the late 1980s, matching the 1988 production date on record.
Read from the original intake capture shown below. Observations only — film is authenticated, not graded.
This original motion picture film element has been examined and authenticated by Crown Grading in partnership with National Film Vault, and encapsulated for archival preservation.
Why so little survivesRelease prints were leased to theaters, not sold. When the run ended they went back to the distributor to be destroyed, and most were. What collectors hold today came from the prints that escaped that order, and no new 35mm prints of these films are being struck.
CROWN SERIAL 000063309
Original Film CaptureAs received
Photographed on the light panel at intake, before encapsulation — tap to open full size
Tap to enlarge
