After the financial success of 1984’s Ghostbusters, it was inevitable that a sequel would eventually emerge, and thankfully, the entire main cast (Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts) returned five years later to fight off NYC’s supernatural community again. While not as inventive and laugh-out-loud hilarious as the original, this sequel is decent enough to be a worthwhile endeavor. Some of the issues I have with Ghostbusters II involves its muddled plot and its overwhelming reliance on special effects, sacrificing some of the quieter moments for more extravagant action sequences.

And on a more personal level, one of the biggest cons for me was the limited amount of NYC locations. It’s very clear they utilized more Los Angeles locations and studio sets than they did in the first film, and the stuff they shot in Manhattan was mostly concentrated in just a few general areas. 

As was the case when I covered the first movie,  I relied heavily on the fabulous and immensely thorough Spook Central website to provide background and evidence for most of these locations. 

 

Dana’s New Apartment

Dana pushes her baby carriage along E 77th Street, as rude New Yorkers do their rude things.

 

She talks to her building superintendent in front of 325 E 77th Street.

 

She is able to convince him to help her with her bags.

 

As they continue to talk, her baby carriage begins to roll away.

 

Dana turns and looks down at her baby, Oscar.

 

The carriage continues to roll east on E 77th Street.

 

She chases after the joyriding baby buggy as it picks up speed.

 

The carriage then swerves into the street just as Dana runs past 341 E 77th Street.

 

The baby carriage then rattles into moving traffic on First Avenue.

 

The carriage finally stops at the corner just as a city bus speeds by.

 

She grabs her infant child, across from 1475 First Avenue.

 

This location was widely identified as taking place on First Avenue and 77th Street. Of course, Dana’s new Upper East Side apartment is nowhere near as popular with movie fans as her original “Spook Central” pad on Central Park West. It’s a pretty nondescript pre-war apartment building, typical for this part of Manhattan.

From November 29, 1988, director Ivan Reitman and his camera crew filmi the carriage rolling away.

For the record, the whole baby carriage chase is geographically correct. It starts at Dana’s apartment building on E 77th Street and heads east to the intersection of 77th and First Avenue, which is only a half block away. But this will be one of the last geographically correct sequences in the film.

 

Ghostbusters Drive to Kids Party

Meanwhile, the dilapidated Ectomobile drives south on Columbus Avenue, passing West 89th Street.

 

The action then jumps by about 30 blocks to the intersection of Sixth Avenue and Central Park South.

 

The begrimed jalopy cruises east, passing 50 Central Park South.

 

The action then moves two blocks west (the wrong direction), where the eastbound Ectomobile passes 2 Columbus Circle.

 

The car turns south onto Broadway (directly in the path the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man took when he first appeared in the original movie).

 

We then jump back to Columbus as the Ghostbusters turn onto W 88th Street.

 

The smoky vehicle disappears down the street.

 

Kids Birthday Party

After a lot of geographical tomfoolery, the Ghostbusters finally arrive at their destination at 420 E 78th Street.

 

Once inside, the action switches to the third floor of Fire Station #23 at 225 East 5th Street in Los Angeles. (The same firehouse used for the interiors of the Ghostbusters’ headquarters.)

 

Back on E 78th Street, the two entertainers exit the townhouse.

 

Despite the kiddie party going poorly, Ray remains positive about their entertainment business.

 

Next begins an awkward exposition monologue from Winston, recapping everything that happened to the Ghostbusters team over the past five years.

 

Ray seems unfazed by Winston’s superfluous retelling of their own backstory.

 

So pretty much all of the driving shots leading up to the kids party were filmed by a second-unit team with a stunt driver operating the Ectomobile. They seem to have just grabbed random shots here and there without much concern about being geographically accurate.

And once they arrive at the birthday party, we are only one block away from where Dana’s apartment is, keeping things nice and close for production.

A wider view of the third floor of firehouse #23, taken in August 2007.

As to the interior of the kids party, the only source I could find that was able to identify its location was on the Spook Central website. As described by webmaster and dedicated Ghosthead, Paul Rudoff:

It took us fans a long time to figure out that this scene was filmed at the old headquarters of Fire Station #23 at 225 East 5th Street in Los Angeles. Yes, the same building used for all Ghostbusters headquarters interiors in both films was also used for this scene. While the headquarters scenes used rooms on the first and second floors, the birthday party was held in the old Captain’s Quarters on the third floor.

 

Dana Visits Egon

Seeking help on her baby carriage fiasco, Dana walks behind the Low Library at Columbia University on her way to talk to Egon.

 

She enters Columbia’s Avery Hall, posing as the Institute for Advanced Theoretical Research.

 

Bookshop

Ray and Egon do some research for Dana at Ray’s bookstore at 33 St Marks Place.

 

The quick scene of Dana entering the Institute for Advanced Theoretical Research was back at Columbia University, which was also featured in the first Ghostbusters movie. Not sure if this is supposed to be the same place, but if so, I guess it would suggest that Egon was able to get rehired by the university.

A 1980s tax photo of 33 St Marks Place, looking closer to how it appeared in Ghostbusters II.

The bookstore on St Marks was obviously identified in no small part to the awning on the neighboring building with its address clearly written on the side.

If it wasn’t for that, it might’ve been challenging to identify the store’s location, especially since the area have changed so much since 1988. The street-level door at 33 St Marks has been replaced with a second-floor staircase and all of the white paint has been stripped away. These changes make it hard to match things up today, but the pair of windows on the far right still line up nicely, and the same tree is still out front, albeit a little chunkier.

 

Digging up the Street

The Ghostbusters team trace the baby carriage path, entering the intersection of E 77th and First Avenue.

 

Ray and Egon analyze the spot where the carriage stopped and get off-the-chart readings on their devices.

 

Confused, Dana asks what exactly those readings mean.

 

Smashcut to night, where the action magically switches to the corner of E 8th Street and S Los Angeles Street in Los Angeles, CA.

 

Confronted by an inquisitive cop, Egon starts to panic while outside of 772 S Los Angeles Street, along the 8th Street side.

 

Venkman does some nonsensical jabber in the thickest New York accent possible, hoping to get the cops off their backs. 

 

This sequence starts off at the same intersection we saw earlier when the baby buggy was going out of control, only this time it’s from the opposite point-of-view, looking northwest towards Dana’s apartment building.

After that, the action switched from NYC to LA in one quick cut. I don’t know why director Ivan Reitman opted to change locations mid-sequence, but I would assume it was either because digging a hole on First Avenue was impractical, or the studio pressured the team to film as much as possible in the Los Angeles area.

While the change in locales is quite apparent now, I must admit, when I first saw this movie in ’89, I didn’t notice a thing. I think by having it go from day to night helped hide the switcheroo. Plus, the art department placed a fake “Food Shoppe” awning on the corner building in both places, giving us at least one consistent visual element.

The same green store awning in New York (top) and Los Angeles (bottom).

When it came to where in LA this scene was filmed, several sources indicated that it was at or near the intersection of E 8th and S Los Angeles Street, but without offering a specific address. So, I ended up relying on a couple YouTube videos to show exactly where the action took place… which turned out to be a big mistake.

I looked at two different videos and both of them placed the action at 732 S Los Angeles Street, which is about a half block away from the actual intersection used in the film. I think what happened was they read somewhere that the filming location was at 8th and Los Angeles Street but assumed it was just a generalization. They ultimately ended up about 100 feet away, probably because they spotted an empty lot there and just assumed it was the same one from the movie.

I can sort of understand the confusion since the buildings that flank the empty lot are similar to the ones in the scene. And even though it’s mid-block, there’s still a crosswalk in the street.

A map showing a section of downtown LA,. The O indicates where the video bloggers placed the action and the X shows the true filming location.

I started questioning these videos when I noticed that the building to the left of the lot wasn’t quite right. In particular, the far window in the movie was noticeably narrower than the one in real life.

A still from the film (top) compared to a view from 732 S Los Angeles St, with a similar-looking building on the left and a lot that is virtually indistinguishable from the movie. 

Another thing that made me question this location was the fact that the reverse shot in the movie didn’t match anything that was on that block.

I finally solved this mix-up while cruising around in Google Street View and discovered a building around the corner at 214 E 8th Street whose windows lined up perfectly with the one in the movie. And when I checked out the reverse view, I could see it also matched up.

A screenshot of the reverse view in the movie (top) compared to a 2009 view of 772 S Los Angeles Street, displaying similar signage and a matching vent (red box).

Generally speaking, if it was a NYC location, I wouldn’t have been so sloppy, but since I don’t know LA that well, I often rely on the “knowledge” of others. Thankfully, I eventually rectified my mistake.

 

Courtroom Trial

After sending all of Manhattan into a total blackout, the Ghostbusters team go on trial at 40 Foley Square, New York.

 

Usually, if there is any sort of trial in a NYC movie, they will use the exterior of one of the two columned buildings in Foley Square. In this case, they used the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse at 40 Foley Square. The interiors were naturally a set, especially considering the scene involved pyrotechnics and blue-screen effects.

 Stuntman Tim Lawrence gets into one of the courtroom ghost costumes at the Industrial Light & Magic studio.

Even though Ghostbusters used a set, I’ve found that some movies that feature these lower Manhattan exteriors will end up using a real New York courtroom. But as far as I can tell, they always end up using one at a completely different (and less busy) neighborhood, such as Queens, the Bronx or even Yonkers.

 

We’re Back!

After getting their case thrown out in court, the Ghostbusters are back in business, installing a new logo outside their headquarters at 14 N Moore Street.

 

A new souped-up “Ecto-1A” zooms past 532-536 Columbus Avenue.

 

The action quickly switches to First Avenue as the vehicle turns onto E 76th Street.

 

Next, the gang exits the former Record Explosion store at 2 Broadway.

 

Ray and Egon collect some pink slime at the Church of Saint Paul the Apostle at 10 Columbus Avenue.

 

Over at the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir in Central Park, a ghost jogger pushes his way through the crowd..

 

Near the 86th Street entrance, Peter Venkman activates the trap with his foot, capturing the speedy jogger (played by Jim Fye).

 

With Ray behind the wheel, the Ecto-1A blasts through a red light on Hudson Street in the West Village.

 

They swerve onto Barrow Street, passing Barrows Pub at 463 Hudson Street. 

 

Over on E 57th Street, the team runs out of Ecto-1A with equipment in hand.

 

They go into Orrefors Crystal Gallery at 58 East 57th Street, now an Aston Martin showroom.

 

Back at the headquarters at 225 East 5th Street in Los Angeles, Louis is freaked out by a loose Slimer. 

 

Returning to NYC, Ray and Egon collect more goo, now at a payphone across from 910 Ninth Avenue.

 

The Ectomobile is seen traveling north on FDR Drive, near E 36th Street.

 

The last shot from this extended montage is back on E 57th Street, looking at the northwest corner of Park Avenue (across from Orrefors Crystal Gallery). 

 

This “We’re Back” montage is very similar to the montage in the first movie —taking place all over Manhattan— but as you look more closely, you can see they did a lot of doubling up at a single location.

Bill Murray outside of the Ghostbusters headquarters on N Moore Street in New York, from a deleted scene.

The montage begins at the iconic firehouse on N Moore Street, with a new logo being added to the building. (To get the same high-angle perspective for my modern picture, I relied on my handy 104 inch selfie stick.)

The interior of the firehouse, which appears later in the montage, was back in the Los Angeles station which is currently under construction. It’s in the process of being converted into a community youth art center.

Circa 2022, looking inside the Los Angeles firehouse at 225 East 5th Street during its renovations. (From the Ghost Beacon YouTube channel.)

While it’s great the city is creating a much-needed youth center in what is a mostly-impoverished section of Los Angeles, it appears they are stripping away a lot of the iconic elements and fixtures. (At this point, I’m not even sure if the fire pole holes will remain.) But in the end, even if a lot of the recognizable elements will be gone, at least Ghostbusters fans will finally have access to this normally-elusive filming location.

The next two shots of the Ecto-1A traveling around the city were filmed near two other driving locations used in the beginning of the movie. One was on Columbus Avenue and the other was on First Avenue. Both of these locations were identified by the Spook Central Website. The Columbus Avenue location was found by cross-referencing the store names seen in the background with a photograph taken around 1990 by the non-profit organization, Landmark West!

A collage of the traveling shot from the movie (inset) compared to a ca 1990 photo of 530-536 Columbus Avenue.

The shot of the Ghostbusters in holiday garb was filmed outside the former Record Explosion at 2 Broadway. Turns out, the store was right across the street from the U.S. Customs House, which we shall soon see, was a major filming location in this movie.

A promotional photo of the Ghostbusters in holiday hats, revealing a wider shot of the record store.

My memory of Record Explosion is that they were a somewhat hip-hop-leaning chain of local stores scattered around Manhattan and Queens. Known for its reliably cheap prices, it felt like this chain of indie stores reached its pinnacle somewhere in the 1990s, as it began selling both music and videos.

But by the mid-2000s, all of the stores were out of business, and the space at 2 Broadway eventually became a Chipotle restaurant.

Inside the 2 Broadway outlet where you can see the nearby Customs House out the window. (Photo from the Record Explosion Facebook Page.)

The next shot of Ray and Egon collecting a slime sample from some church steps was apparently a real puzzler that took Ghostbusters fans decades to identify.

Its whereabouts was eventually published on the Spook Central website but it wasn’t explained how it was found. I assume someone just searched through images of Manhattan churches until landing on the relatively-unchanged Church of St Paul the Apostle. (I’ve personally been inside this church many times as its basement is often used as a catering location for film and TV productions.)

After the church was identified, the folks at Spook Central were able to immediately find the location of the payphone scene since it was literally one block away. It makes sense since both involve the same three things: Ray, Egon and pink slime.

The jogging scene has been identified by many sites, so I have no idea who first found it, but there are many clues that would lead a skilled location-seeker to the reservoir in Central Park. And the one thing that helped fans find the exact spot of the trap was a weird marking at the base of the fence.

Close up of the reservoir fence from the movie (top) and from a 2014 video (bottom) both featuring a painted symbol at the base.

It’s clearly been repainted several times since the movie was made, but I haven’t been able to figure out what it exactly represents. My guess is it’s some mile marker, but who knows for sure?

Barrows Pub from around 2019, whose exterior was featured in Ghostbusters II.

After the jogger scene, we get a quick shot of the Ectomobile speeding through a red light at Hudson and Barrow Street. I instantly recognized this location since it features the exterior of Barrows Pub, a place I frequented numerous times when I lived in the West Village.

I always found the regulars at the Barrows to be a little odd (like one guy who went by the name, One-Armed Joe from the Alamo), but the atmosphere was generally friendly, selling cheap drinks, and microwaved pizzas. They also managed to squeeze a jukebox, a pool table, a video game machine (which a customer once attempted to steal) and a dart board into the small wood-paneled space.

The next scene takes place at Orrefors, a high-end glassware boutique on East 57th. While the interior was most certainly a set, the real-life interior is now an Aston Martin showroom. So I guess that space is reserved for fancy shops only.

After a quick shot of FDR Drive, this montage ends with the boys running towards camera with traps in hand. This was found by Lars Karlsen in conjunction with the Spook Central website. Working on a hunch, he was able to figure out that this fairly nondescript shot was filmed across the street from Orrefors. It was confirmed by matching up the specks in the granite cornerstone of 456 Park Ave.

A close up on the granite of the corner building, comparing the 1989 movie with a 2016 photo taken by Lars Karlsen.

It’s another example of the film crew maximizing the use of a single location by basically swinging the camera around and shooting in the opposite direction.

 

Haunted Museum

Peter goes to the art museum where Dana works, which is the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House at 1 Bowling Green.

 

Inside, Peter is greeted by a friendly security guard who was a fan of his psychics TV show.

 

The rest of the museum interiors were shot on Stage 16 at Warner Brothers Studios in Burbank, CA.

 

Night falls on the Midtown East skyline, as seen from Long Island City, Queens.

 

The next day, the Ghostbusters arrive at the museum to investigate things.

 

Peter meets up with the guys who pull up from 1 Broadway.

 

Ray gives Peter the rundown of Vigo, “the scourge of Carpathia,” whose possessed painting is in the museum.

 

Egon lists off other monikers of the 16th-century tyrant, all of which are none too flattering.

 

So, this was the most-used location in the film, and was also the easiest to identify. The former customs building is very distinct looking and has been featured in many other films, including the 1928 silent comedy, Speedy, Billy Wilder’s 1960 film, The Apartment and 1995’s Batman Forever.

While the building wasn’t a museum at the time this movie was made, shortly thereafter, the lower floors were converted into the Museum of the American Indian, which still operates there today.

The cast and director Ivan Reitman pose outside the U.S. Customs House in Bowling Green.

As I mentioned above, most of the museum interiors were shot on Stage 16 at Warner Brothers’ Burbank Studio, which is one of the tallest soundstages in the world. Originally named Stage 7, the structure was raised 30 feet shortly after its construction in 1935 to allow for the filming of the musical finale of Cain and Mabel.

From 1935, Soundstage 7 (later renamed 16) at Warner Bros studios in Burbank as it was being lifted 30 feet from the bottom up.

As the story goes, William Randolph Hearst, whose mistress Marion Davies was the star of Cain and Mabel, got into a hissy fit when the standard 45-foot high soundstage couldn’t accommodate the movie’s $400,000 grand finale featuring a 90-foot pipe organ and 160 chorus girls.

So Hearst paid Warners $100,000 to raise Soundstage 7 to the needed height by having them hand-jack the bottom off the ground, one foot at a time. Every time the bottom got raised a little bit, workers would insert railroad ties into the gap. They continued this laborious routine until the stage reached its current height of 98 feet. Afterwards, the foundation and walls were quickly built, and the soundstage was ready to be used for the musical finale.

The stage also includes a 2,000,000 gallon water tank which was used in such moisture-laden films as The Perfect Storm and The Goonies.

 

Louis Asks Janine Out

Later that day, Janine closes up shop at the headquarters on N Moore Street.

 

A manic Louis mumbles to himself as Janine takes off.

 

He stops her at the corner of Varick Street, wanting to ask her out to dinner.

 

She tells him she’s babysitting Oscar at Peter’s place, but that he can join her if he likes.

 

After Janine walks away, Louis is startled by oncoming traffic.

 

Peter’s Apartment

Over at Peter’s apartment at 644 Broadway, Dana moves in with her baby Oscar. 

 

Later that evening, Peter exits his building to hail a cab for his date with Dana.

 

He is stopped by the rest of the gang, dressed in yellow slickers.

 

They tell Peter that they have traced where the pink slime is going and ask him to come join them.

 

As Dana comes out for their date, it’s clear Peter is not going anywhere near any pink slime

 

The first scene was obviously at the famed firehouse on North Moore Street, but what’s baffling is how little it’s featured in the film. Aside from the above “Louis Asks Janine Out” scene, the exterior is only seen in a couple quick shots, mostly featuring Rick Moranis.

As to Peter’s apartment, I can’t remember if I found it on my own or not. But at this point, it’s commonly known by movie aficionados to be on the corner of Broadway and Bleecker.

Strangely enough, this scene where the boys invite Peter to join them in their slime adventure was shot two times. The unused version took place inside Peter’s apartment, rather than out on the street. I believe all the New York stuff was shot first in the schedule, which would mean the interior version was shot later, but ultimately rejected.

A still from a deleted version of the “Cockroach Breeding” scene.

This deleted version is available on the latest home discs and is currently on YouTube. There’s not much of a difference in dialogue between the two versions, but I actually think the interior version is a little bit better; for some reason, Harold Ramis’ line delivery on the street seems kind of stilted.

 

Restaurant

Peter and Dana go on their date at Armand’s, which was really Val’s restaurant at 10130 Riverside Drive, Toluca Lake, CA.

 

The slime-soaked boys enter the restaurant, telling Peter about the river of slime under the city.

 

I probably never would’ve been able to find this restaurant location on my own — all credit goes again to the Spook Central website. These days, you won’t be able to see anything resembling a restaurant at this Toluca Lake location because, as you can tell from the images above, the space is currently a Trader Joe’s.

From an Entertainment Tonight segment in 1989, some behind-the-scenes footage at Vals restaurant in California, which was one of the last things to be filmed.

A sequence that was intercut with these restaurant scenes was one that took place in the haunted tunnels of an old subway line, which was mostly shot on sets in Burbank. But supposedly, part of it was shot at Tunnel Nightclub at 220 12th Avenue in NYC.

The club was inside the old Terminal Warehouse Company Building whose massive arches on 11th and 12th Avenues used to admit freight trains for storage and unloading.

The nightclub operated from 1986 to 2001, but no photos have been unearthed to provide definitive proof that the movie was filmed there. So, this is technically one of only a couple unresolved locations from Ghostbusters II (the other is the hallway in the mental institution, but it’s been suggested that that was filmed in the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles).

 

Gracie Mansion

Police bring the Ghostbusters to Gracie Mansion, which is really Greystone Mansion & Park at 905 Loma Vista Drive, Beverly Hills, CA.

 

As they go in, the doorman (played by pop singer, Bobby Brown) asks Ray and Egon if they could get him one of the proton packs for his kid brother.

 

Inside the Drawing Room at Greystone Mansion, the mayor listens to the apocalyptic predictions of the Ghostbusters team.

 

Ray explains that a sea of psychomagnatheric slime will soon cause havoc on the metropolis.

 

While some folks thought this was shot at the actual New York Mayor’s residence, Gracie Mansion, it was instead filmed at the most overused mansion in the Hollywood area — Greystone. This Beverly Hills estate has been featured in countless movies and TV shows, including the cult classic, The Big Lebowski.

The outside area is open to the public year round, but the interior is less accessible, only open to the public on special occasions.

 

Mayhem in the City

Dana gets out of a cab in front of the museum at 1 Bowling Green.

 

She heads up the stairs in pursuit of her baby, which was stolen earlier.

 

She looks around at the ominous surroundings, desperate to save her child.

 

She then goes inside the museum which immediately gets encased in pink slime.

 

Meanwhile, a ghost chases an audience out of Movieland Theatre at 1567 Broadway in Times Square.

 

A mink coat comes alive, attacking its owner outside the 5th Street entrance of the Biltmore Hotel at 506 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles.

 

Back in NYC, another group of people are seen fleeing, this time along the Fifth Avenue side of 13 Washington Square North. 

 

We then see what they are running from — a large ghostly creature mounting the Arch at Washington Square Park.

 

Released from the booby hatch, the boys race the Ecto-1A to the museum, but are going in the wrong direction, heading north on Third Avenue instead of south.

 

They turn west onto E 14th Street, which still doesn’t get them on track to the museum in Bowling Green.

 

Finally at the museum on the southern tip of Manhattan, the Ghostbusters see that the entire building is covered in slime.

 

Ray says it looks like a giant Jell-O mold, which prompts Peter to make a wisecrack about the gelatin dessert.

Once again mirroring the first movie, this Ghostbusters sequel has its own “city out of control” montage right before the climactic ending. But this montage ended up having much fewer gags and a limited number of NYC locations.

It starts with Dana going into the museum, followed by the building getting completely covered in pink slime. Most of the effects used for this gimmick look decent, except for the wide overhead shot, which looks more like a cartoon (and includes tons of geographical inaccuracies).

A still from the film (top), which aside from the museum and park, in no way resembles the real Bowling Green area, as shown in this 2023 satellite view (bottom).   

The montage really gets going when a group of terrified theater patrons are seen fleeing for their lives. But the way these shots were framed, you’d hardly be able to tell that it took place in Times Square at the former Movieland Theater at 1567 Broadway.

From 1986, the Movieland Theatre at 1567 Broadway in Times Square.

Built for the Shubert Brothers in the late 1910s as the Central Theatre, the Broadway space originally operated as a legitimate theater. By the 1930s, the Central became a permanent movie house, although there were occasional attempts a turn it into an “all-girl revue.” After going though decades of different names and venue iterations, the theater became known as Movieland, keeping that name from 1980 to 1989 when the theater finally shut down.

Afterwards, the lobby was turned into the Roxy Deli, and the auditorium became a disco called Dance USA. By the mid-1990s, both had closed and the building sat vacant until the auditorium was demolished in the early 2000s to make way for a W Hotel. The Roxy later became a Radio Shack, and is now an upscale jewelry shop.

From 2014, when a Radio Shack occupied Movieland’s former lobby space.

The montage then gives us a quick gag of of minks coming alive outside LA’s Biltmore Hotel (which served as the haunted Sedgewick Hotel in the first film). Next, we’re back in NYC down at Washington Square Park where a giant ghost mounts the iconic arch. This was apparently a leftover gag from the first film when production was planning on having Dana’s apartment at 1 Fifth Avenue, located one block north of the park.

One of the scenes taking place at a mental hospital, made up of several different locations, including the VA Medical Center in Brentwood, CA.

The montage ends with the boys being released from a mental institution and racing in the Ecto-1A to the pink-covered museum.

A behind-the-scenes photo at Bowling Green as the actors rehearse a scene.

Down at the museum, production had about 500 extras on call, but that number slowly grew as the night went on, as Ghostbusters fans kept wanting to be in the movie’s sequel.

Lady Liberty Walks the Streets

Animated by “positively-charged slime,” the Statue of Liberty walks on W 54th Street, passing the Canada Building at 680 Fifth Avenue.

 

She then makes her way north on Fifth Avenue.

 

Miss Liberty puts her foot down in front of Trump Tower at 725 Fifth Avenue.

 

As Ray operates the large statue with a control panel, he accidentally steps on and flattens a police car (which we can only hope was unoccupied at the time) parked in front of 703 Fifth Avenue .

 

This is probably my least favorite part of the movie. The logic behind slime being able to make a copper statue bend like a human being is lost on me, and the characters betting that a walking Lady Liberty will make everyone in New York suddenly cheerful seems a bit far-fetched, even for a supernatural comedy. The whole thing comes off as a little corny, and the special effects are not so great.

The cast sit inside a replica of the Statue’s crown in a Californian studio.

And as one more thing to irritate me about this sequence, the geography is all wacky. The statue’s progress on Fifth Avenue follows no logic, jumping from place to place.

But even more illogical is the fact that they’re in Midtown Manhattan at all. The museum is at Bowling Green at the southern tip of the island, adjacent to the New York Harbor, where Liberty Island is. So, after crossing the harbor, the museum would’ve been one of the first places they’d encounter after making landfall.

 

Louis Catches a Bus

Geared up and ready to go, Louis emerges from the firehouse at 14 N Moore Street in New York City. (Fake doors were installed to match the firehouse in Los Angeles.)

 

Suddenly, we’re back up near Dana’s apartment building, along First Avenue near E 76th Street.

 

Louis waits at the bus stop in front of 1456 First Avenue.

 

The M15 bus soon arrives and opens its doors.

 

Louis is shocked to see that Slimer is inexplicably driving the bus.

 

Later, after saving the world once again, the Ghostbusters team exit the museum at 1 Bowling Green.

 

To finish things off, we have one last geographical inconsistency, where Louis exits the firehouse down in Tribeca and runs about 110 blocks to the Upper East Side, just to take a bus back down to Lower Manhattan.

After that, the movie’s finale takes place at the museum, where most of it was filmed on a Burbank soundstage. Overall, a kind of anticlimactic ending to the movie, without any memorable “cross the streams” moments.

 

Despite my little quibbles and complaints, there are enough funny and clever moments in Ghostbusters II to make it a worthy sequel. While nowhere near as great at the original, the biggest strength in this 1989 movie is its cast.

All the actors go full-tilt with their characters, giving it as much gusto as possible.

The one clear stand-out was Peter MacNicol’s depiction of Janosz, Dana’s clunky boss at the museum, making him one of the most lovably comic villains in movie history.

I still wish there were a few less fantastical scenes and few more quieter comical moments. But at least the cast and crew tried to emulate the style and tone of the first film, unlike the latest franchise sequels, which seem to be more inspired by the MCU or the TV show, Stranger Things.

Compared to those 21st-century efforts, Ghostbusters II is an absolute masterpiece!