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Directed By
Richard Donner
Written By:
Chris Columbus, Steven Spielberg
Cast:
Sean Astin, Josh Brolin, Corey Feldman, Martha Plimpton, John Matuszak, Robert Davi, Anne Ramsey, Mary Ellen Trainor, Jonathan Ke Quan, Kerri Green, Joe Pantoliano, Jeff Cohen, Lupe Ontiveros, Curtis Hanson, Keith Walker
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The Goonies (1985)
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Movie Review by Ezra
February 16th, 2007
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You know what I love about the '80s?
Public Enemy, NWA, Prince, Guns N' Roses, and the fact that The Toxic Avenger, an unrated film that shows a kid's head getting smashed by a car - in graphic, bloody close-up - within the first thirty minutes, was inexplicably made into a children's cartoon on broadcast television.
You know what I hate about the '80s?
Reaganomics, Reagan, Bush, and now that I've pretty much got you all on my side, let me do a 180 and say I hate The f*cking Goonies!
Okay, so you hate me now, but I defy you, any of you, to give me any kind of logical argument for why anyone over the age of ten, with an IQ over 100, should like this film, let alone consider it "the greatest adolescent adventure film of all time," as at least one critic has dubbed it.
Now, I'll admit that I am lacking the one and only prerequisite for liking The Goonies: I never saw it as a kid. I know dozens of people who profess to love the film because they grew up with it. Most of them haven't seen it since they were kids, but that's beside the point. The point is, I also never saw Labyrinth or The Princess Bride or The Neverending Story as a kid, but I still love those movies now, after having seen them as an adult. Why? Because they're actually good films!
The Goonies, on the other hand, has one good thing going for it: Chunk. Perhaps the only worthwhile scene in the whole godforsaken film is Chunk's tearful confession of causing a massive puke-fest (which, admittedly, would have been funnier if it were shown rather than merely described, a la Stand By Me, an infinitely superior "adolescent adventure film"). Chunk's other shining moment is, of course, the infamous "truffle shuffle," a cheap joke at the expense of a fat kid that I would still rather watch for three hours than sit through the rest of the movie.
The rest of the characters I couldn't give less of a sh*t about if I was constipated!
But let's not forget the slight undercurrent of racism to be seen in the uber-smart Asian kid who's really good at math and science. For some reason, in the '80s, this was the most popular stereotype; remember Sixteen Candles and "Long Duk Dong"? Someone should get their ass kicked by the ghost of Bruce Lee for that one. Or how about A Christmas Story? A sweet, nostalgic family film that I love through and through, until the end, when it suddenly becomes a bad ethnic joke: "Deck the hars wif boughs of horry!" Isn't it funny? We're better than them!
But, I digress. It's not that The Goonies is a terrible movie, it's just that, like Rocky, Tron, E.T., Spaceballs, or any number of other so-called "classics" of that approximate era, it is over-rated, and doesn't deserve the cult status it has, which, more than anything, just baffles me. There are adults all over the country who remember this overblown spectacle of mediocrity with fondness, and who have probably never even seen Time Bandits, for god's sake!
And I know this is getting a bit long-winded, and The Goonies really isn't worth five minutes of my time, so let me just conclude by saying a friend of mine once belittled The Lost Boys as nothing more than The Goonies with vampires, and maybe he was right, but in my eyes, that alone makes it a hundred times cooler, and I for one will sleep better tonight dreaming of David, Marco and the rest of the Boys feasting on every last one of those stupid kids and preventing them from ever completing their lame-ass adolescent adventure.
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 | Jenny
Feb 19, 2007 9:15 AM
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| Whaaaaat??? Say it ain't so, Ezra, say it ain't so! |
 | Kristin
Feb 19, 2007 12:01 PM
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| Hmmmm, to me it kind of sounds like the author "doth protest too much". |
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