Ghostbusters grew out of Dan Aykroyd's fascination with the paranormal, which ran in his family. In 1981 he read an article on quantum physics and parapsychology that gave him the idea of trapping ghosts. He wrote a script intended for himself, Eddie Murphy and John Belushi, but Belushi died in March 1982. Bill Murray joined, and Aykroyd pitched the concept as three men who chase ghosts. Director Ivan Reitman insisted the story be set on Earth and grounded in realism, which made the supernatural elements funnier. Reitman, Aykroyd and Harold Ramis then rewrote the script over a few weeks on Martha's Vineyard. They gave the team distinct roles: Ramis as the brains, Aykroyd as the heart and Murray as the mouth. Columbia Pictures agreed to a budget of 25 to 30 million dollars with a June 1984 release.

In 1909 D. W. Griffith made a 14-minute film about a speculator who corners the wheat market and doubles the price of bread. A farmer sows his field while a 'Wheat King' gambles in the Chicago wheat pit; bakers raise the loaf from five cents to ten and the poor line up for bread. Griffith cut back and forth between the farm, the feast and the breadline, a technique called parallel editing, so audiences saw both ends of the economy at once. The film drew on Frank Norris's stories and on a real scheme: months earlier Chicago financier James Patten had cornered wheat, sent bread prices up and made about $5 million, roughly $185 million today.