Hey you guys!!! (The Goonies (DVD))

Member Name: dididave

Product:	The Goonies (DVD)
Date:	30/04/06 (1300 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: 80's feelgood at its best.

Disadvantages: Corny dialogue, looks dated with the advent of CGI.

The Goonies are a gang of kids in small town America who think they will be friends for life until Mikey, one of the gang finds out they are bout to move house and town. Thanks to a new housing development set to demolish their home, unless they can find a huge amount of cash “The Goonies” will be no more. They are given one last hope when they stumble across an old treasure map hidden within their fathers attic said to have belonged to famous pirate “One Eyed Willy”. Unfortunately, the start to their quest is at the Frateli's hideout. A vicious family of criminals. Can Mikey, Data, Chunk and the gang find the treasure, evade the Frateli's and save their home?

The Goonies is such a trip through nostalgia for any child of the 1980's. Directed by Steven Spielberg and released in 1985 it represents everything good and bad from the 80's from awful fashion sense (sweat bands and Hawaiian shirts anyone?) and dodgy hairstyles to great music and chopper bikes it is all here in this one movie. This is a film about friendship, a sense of belonging and in typical Steven Spielberg way, a film about Good triumphing over Evil. This is the ultimate feel good movie, every child on its release wanted to be a Goonie and on subsequent sittings with my own children they feel much the same.

This is not to say The Goonies is a flawless piece of cinema. It is so unrelentingly 1980's that it is very much a sugar coated cheese fest of corny dialogue and inspirational speeches. You will cringe as Mikey tells you what it means to be a Goonie. However, you will also love every minute of it. Its undoubted corniness only adds to the films charm as you get swept along by its imaginative cast of characters from Data, the Japanese James Bond wannabe with temperamental gadgetry to Mouth, the joker who always has an answer. The vast array of characters in “The Goonies” means everybody has a favourite who they empathise with and wants to be. Unfortunately, Spielberg does somewhat hammer the moral of “never judging a book by its cover” down our childhood throats in the form of the Frankenstein like deformation that is Sloth. Fortunately, we barely notice as Sloth is such a hugely likeable character and steals the show with pretty much all the best scenes.

The Goonies is a film that has not dated particularly well and the special effects although undoubtedly great for the time are very ordinary now in the advent of Computer Generated Imagery. You can almost see the plastic sheen on some of the rocks! However, the action is still magical and if you can suspend disbelief for 114 minutes you will enjoy every minute. This is a film with a cracking 80's soundtrack by Cyndi Lauper that adds to the overall warm feeling and is oh so appropriate.

Perhaps the only issue people may have with this film is that the only female influence is in the form of two screaming girl tag along cheerleader types. As such this may be seen as something of a boys movie. However, its sense of humour throughout lends a real tongue in cheek feel and with moments of true slapstick and laugh out loud scenes this is a family movie that should offer something for everyone (although perhaps a little dark for the very young).

The Goonies is a movie you will watch again and again whether you are a Goonie yourself or a first timer this is true family entertainment at its best. The acting is not great despite the childhood presence of Corey Feldman and Josh Brolin but if you can suspend disbelief for the duration of the film I promise you will love it. Where else can you learn the “truffle shuffle”?

Summary: Who doesn't want to be a Goonie!