Sunday, September 5, 2010

A Fun Review Of The Goonies

By Christie Boyle

Goonies for life! If you were a child of the eighties, you certainly remember this classic. If you haven't seen it yet, think Stand By Me meets Indiana Jones meets Pirates of the Caribbean. The end result is a thrilling, funny, exciting, and really fun adventure flick that entertains everybody of every age no matter who you are. If it's been awhile, put it on your movie downloads queue and relive the eighties with one of the all time great family adventure films.

The movie follows, who else, The Goonies. This gang of misfits, led by Mikey Walsh, is known around the city of Astoria, Oregon for always getting into some sort of trouble. The story really kicks off when the rich folks in town decide to buy up the neighborhood to convert it into a golf course. The city of Astoria is really gorgeous, and it's too bad that it only features prominently in the first act of the film before it gets into the cave-dwelling adventure stuff.

So of course, the Goonies take it upon themselves to save the neighborhood, right? Right. Mikey finds an old pirate treasure map in dad's stuff in the attic, and he and the Goonies follow it to an old abandoned restaurant out on the coast at the edge of town. Turns out, some real sleazy gangsters are hiding out there, the Fratellis. These guys, led by Ma Fratelli, a real ball buster, are about as sleazy as it gets, as played by Joe Pantoliano and Robert Davi.

Does the plot sound complicated? It actually isn't, it's just really fast paced. Don't worry, you don't have to keep all of this in mind. From moment to moment, all the booby traps, gangsters and grown ups are really doing is giving the Goonies something to run away from while they bond as friends and seek out the treasure to save their neighborhood.

It's really just a whole lot of fun. It inspires you with a sense of adventure, like this stuff can happen in real life. While it's not likely that it WILL happen, the movie is at least rooted enough in reality that it doesn't get into the supernatural or anything like that, so it could, technically, happen in real life, no matter how implausible and unlikely that might be.

When the film came out, it was considered to be a little TOO fast paced, with booby traps and swordfights breaking out at the drop of a hat. However, when compared to the manic pace of most modern children's films, The Goonies is downright laid back.

Anyways, it really is one of the quintessential eighties flicks. The style, the music, the genre, even, it's all eighties, so at the very least, it'll bring you back if you grew up in that decade.

But it really is a classic in its own right. If you haven't seen it in awhile, watch it again. Any child of the eighties should have a copy on their hard drive ready to watch at the drop of a hat. You'll need it for when you have kids of your own and you want them to know how good movies used to be back when you were a kid! - 40728

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