Question: Was Jane lying when she said that she decorated the Maitland home (she wanted Lydia to mention this to her parents)?
raywest
15th Oct 2024
Beetlejuice (1988)
Answer: It's never answered in the film if she actually decorated the house for Adam and Barbara, but there isn't really any reason to doubt it.
My interpretation was that Jane was always chasing a buck. She aggressively pestered Adam and Barbara to sell the house just to earn a commission. She was hustling the Deetzes for her decorating services. Regarding Barbara and Adam, they just didn't want anyone in their beloved house, much less having it redecorated after all the work they did on it.
But if she actually did, then I wonder if they would care as much about the Deetzes remodeling the home?
This is a stretch, but maybe Jane wanted to keep the house as close to how Adam and Barbara had it, like a shrine. It's not uncommon for those who lost loved ones to try and keep things as close to what was possible.
What I meant was, why would Adam and Barbara, not Jane, be so upset about the remodeling if Jane did the decorating anyway? Granted, they apparently chose to live with it.
That was probably a comfort thing. They learned they were going to spend over a century in that house, and it would be one thing if it was closer to what they were comfortable with, but the Deetzes' style was too much for them.
17th Jun 2024
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: Whenever Beetlejuice is shown in the model cemetery that Adam made, does it mean that a "real" Beetlejuice is the real cemetery in the town?
Answer: No. It's not meant to be an exact replica of the town cemetery. Beetlejuice just inserted himself into it.
17th Jun 2024
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: I hope this question is not too speculative, but why would it be bad for living people to learn about the afterlife? Juno tells Adam and Barbara that they can't let people find out.
Answer: Probably because people would go to extreme lengths to try and contact the dead. There would be a media frenzy. It would create a massive opportunity for shyster mediums to victimize living people who want to communicate with lost loved ones. Science would be turned upside down investigating it. There would be all kinds of religious issues and conflicts. People would want to commit suicide to leave unhappy lives. The dead would be hounded relentlessly and never able to "rest in peace" again.
19th May 2024
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: Otho says he was a paranormal researcher until "the bottom dropped out in '72." What does that mean - specifically, what happened in 1972?
Answer: In all probability, it has no relevance to the real world. In the world of the film, something unexplained happened in that year.
19th May 2024
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: Why does Charles insist on referring to Delia as Lydia's mother, not stepmother? Even when he and Lydia are alone. (For example, the moment when he thinks Lydia is wearing one of the bedsheets, pretending to be a ghost.)
Answer: I think Delia actually is Lydia's mother, at least in this movie. They don't get along, so Lydia rebels by pretending that Delia is a stepmother.
16th Sep 2021
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: How is Lydia able to see Adam and Barbara along with Beetlejuice? Did she have some sort of near death experience or maybe inherited something from her family?
27th Oct 2020
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: When Beetlejuice replaces the handrail as a snake, I don't understand the line, "We've come for your daughter, Chuck." I know "Chuck" is "Charles" so who is "we" and why does he say "they" are only there for Lydia? (01:00:28)
Answer: In addition, it's possible that Beetlejuice was trying to rope Adam and Barbara in on the idea, since they did request for his help to get the Deetzes out of the house. He might've thought they were working together.
Answer: It's a rather outdated usage. Queen Victoria was known for using the "Royal We," saying things like, "We are not amused." It was a way of saying something without being directly accountable for it. Others use it merely as an embellished speaking effect, meant as hyperbole. That is what Beetlejuice is doing to sound loftier.
It's not that outdated. The "royal we" is still in use. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_we.
30th Oct 2018
Beetlejuice (1988)
Question: Is there any reason besides plot convenience that the Deetzes didn't enter the attic during the three months that the Maitlands were away from the house to meet with Juno? I realise they don't have the key, but seeing as how they were renovating the entire house anyway, it seems like they would have had no problem just knocking the door down.
Answer: No reason was given, but they probably felt no immediate need to enter the attic. I've never been in my own house's attic. As you pointed out, it's really a matter of plot convenience.
Answer: After the dinner scene when Otho asked where they hid and Lydia said "the attic" Charles replied that the attic was locked. So it seems like she never told them she had the skeleton key.
I addressed this in the question. A key is not required to get into the attic because they could just break the door down.
Except they didn't break the door down. Delia kept banging on the door until it opened. If they had broken the door down, there would have been some damage.
Answer: This is purely for convenience. It's always bothered me. Like since the early 90s when I first had a VHS copy to rewind. That whole house has been gutted and rebuilt but no-one got in to the attic for 3 months? That's BS. For one thing not only would someone like Charles Deets want to see every square inch of his property, but a major company/contractor doing a remodel of that size would have at some time needed access to and been on every square foot of that house.
Quite often, people don't think about the attic along with the rest of the house. Many of them won't be going into the attic every day, not every month, maybe not more than once a year.
Join the mailing list
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.
Answer: Jane appears to be taking credit for what Barbara and Adam had done. At the beginning of the movie, the Maitlands are discussing the home projects they've been working on. Adam has been refinishing cabinetry while Barbara has chosen wallpaper, and they're spending their two-week vacation working on the house.
raywest ★