'Ghostbusters' reboot director Paul Feig says female-led movie was hindered by 'anti-Hillary movement'

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Paul Feig, the director and co-writer of the 2016 "Ghostbusters" reboot, noted in a recent interview about the film that he believes the "anti-Hillary movement" played a big role in the movie’s negative perception. 

The 57-year-old director’s announcement in 2015 that he would reboot the beloved comedy franchise with an all-female cast led by Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones drew a slew of criticism from fans of the original movies. The film ultimately underperformed at the box office, only earning $229.1 million worldwide. 

Speaking in an interview on Jess Cagle’s SiriusXM show, Feig explained that he was shocked by the backlash and blames its poor reception on the political climate of the year it came out. 

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Director Paul Feig (center), said the political climate of 2016 hurt his female-led 'Ghostbusters' reboot. (Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

"I think that some really brilliant author or researcher or sociologist needs to write a book about 2016 and how intertwined we were with Hillary and the anti-Hillary movement, it was just this year where, I don’t know, just everyone went to a boiling point," he told the host. "I don’t know if it was having an African American president for eight years teed them up or something, but they were ready to explode."

Feig went on to reference a 2015 video Donald Trump shared on his Instagram in which he appeared baffled by the idea of remaking "Ghostbusters" with an all-female cast. 

"By the time I announced in… 2015, when I announced I was going to do it, it started. There’s tape of Donald Trump being like, ‘Now the Ghostbusters are women, what’s going on?’" Feig said. "Like, it’s crazy how people got nuts about women trying to be in power or be in positions that they weren’t normally in. It was an ugly, ugly year." 

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In the past, some like original film director Ivan Reitman have made the argument that people’s critique with the film had less to do with the fact that the cast was female-driven and more that people were simply nostalgic for the original cast, all of whom had a cameo in the 2016 movie.

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However, Reitman’s son, Jason, 41, is stepping into the ring himself by helming the upcoming "Ghostbusters: Afterlife" film starring Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Paul Rudd and Mckenna Grace and Bill Murray.