Ghostbusters - Plot

Plot

Following their first encounter with a ghost, misfit parapsychologists Peter Venkman (Bill Murray), Raymond Stantz (Dan Aykroyd), and Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis) lose their jobs at Columbia University. Unable to research their discovery, the trio establish a paranormal exterminator service known as "Ghostbusters" in a retired firehouse. Lacking customers and faced with dwindling funds, they are eventually hired by the Sedgewick Hotel to investigate a haunting. At the hotel, they capture their first ghost and deposit it in a "containment unit" located in the firehouse basement. Paranormal activity begins to increase in New York City, and the Ghostbusters become celebrities containing it, while at the same time becoming increasingly burdened by the hectic schedule. The group later hire a fourth member, Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson), to help them cope with the demands.

The Ghostbusters are hired by Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver), whose apartment is haunted by a demonic spirit called Zuul, a demigod worshipped as a servant to Gozer the Gozerian, a fictitious Sumerian shape-changer god of destruction. Venkman takes a particular interest in the case, competing for Dana's affection with her neighbor, Louis Tully (Rick Moranis). As they investigate, Dana is possessed by Zuul, which declares itself "The Gatekeeper", and Louis by a similar demon called Vinz Clortho, "The Keymaster." Both demons speak of the coming of the destructive Gozer, and the Ghostbusters plan to keep the two apart. Thereafter, the Ghostbusters' office is visited by Walter Peck (William Atherton), a lawyer representing the EPA, who arrests the team for operating an unlicensed nuclear device in their basement and orders their ghost containment grid deactivated, unleashing hundreds of captured ghosts onto the city. Freed from the Ghostbusters' custody, Louis/Vinz advances toward Dana/Zuul's apartment while the escaped ghosts create havoc throughout the city.

Consulting blueprints of Dana's apartment, the Ghostbusters learn that it was built by mad doctor and cult leader Ivo Shandor, who designed the building as a gateway to summon Gozer and bring about the end of the world, claiming humanity was too sick to survive after the horrors of World War I. The Ghostbusters are brought to the mayor's office and freed in order to combat the paranormal activity, but are unable to prevent the arrival of Gozer, who initially appears as a woman (Slavitza Jovan). Briefly subdued by the team, Gozer disappears, but her voice echoes that the "destructor" will follow, taking a form chosen by the team. Venkman, holding that this means that whatever they imagine will appear as a destroying force, urges his comrades to avoid giving form to the destructor by clearing their minds. Unable to keep his mind blank, Stantz remembers a beloved corporate mascot from childhood, "something that could never, ever possibly destroy us," whereupon the destructor arrives in Stantz's chosen form of the giant Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and begins laying waste to the city. To defeat this manifestation, the team decides to merge the energy streams of their proton packs (against which they were advised earlier in the film) while directing these against Gozer's entrance. The plan succeeds, banishing Gozer back to whence it came, sealing the gateway between the worlds, and destroying the Marshmallow Man in a single explosion. Soon thereafter, Dana and Louis are freed from the ashen remains of their possessors. As hundreds of New Yorkers wipe the melted marshmallow goo from their brows, the Ghostbusters are applauded by the city's population.